FSB, Russian security service, according to Vissarion accuses him of “extremism” http://www.kasparov.ru/material.php?id=47F0A61D84736 (in Russian)Vissarion Aseev, civil activist from town of Beslan in North Ossetia/North Caucasus (this town became known in the world after hostages were taken at one of its schools in September 2004 that ended in bloodshed and killing of over 330 hostages, mostly children). Vissarion, whom I have known personally since that attack has supported victims of Beslan hostage attack that were trying to find out why that attack happened, why so many hostages were killed and called the Russian authorities to answer. However, instead of answering their plea, the authorities put a lot of pressure on organisations like Voice of Beslan, Mothers of Beslan and individuals, trying to stop them from seeking the truth.In November 2007 Mr Aseev tried to run for the parliament’s seat and published a political manifesto in the North Ossetian paper http://sv.ossetia.ru/Script/search1.php?misc=search&subaction=showfull&id=1196439068&archive=&cnshow=news&ucat=2&start_from=& (in Russian) The main point of the manifesto was that Mr Aseev called on the Ossetian politicians to strive for independent Ossetia. This was first call for Ossetian independence in such a widely circulated paper. The whole circulation of the paper was confiscated though by the police, accusing him of breaking election law. However, it stayed on the paper’s website. Besides being an activist at home in North Ossetia, Mr Aseev is also a member of Russian opposition – United Civil Front, that is run by Garry Kasparov.This new turn, accusing Vissarion Aseev of being “exremist” leads the situation right to the times of colonialism and exposes the nature of the contemporary Russian state as a multinational empire, despite the fact that USSR ceased to exist.
Archive for March, 2008
Spring
There was a story I read maybe 20 years ago or so about spring. It was set in a Russian blacksmiths’ town. A little talented boy to everybody’s surprise produced a branch of tree out of iron, that looked so natural that when he put it on the tree, birds sat on it and sang. When the amazed crowd asked him what he was thinking about when creating this branch, he said:
- I though that when spring comes, people become better.
- Are they bad otherwise? – they asked him
- Yes – he answered
Why am I saying this? Because spring has come and I may have become slightly better:) Long time ago I accidentally got to know an amateur musician and singer over internet that was looking for a patritotic Ossetian texts. I didn’t have patriotic texts to my disgrace, but I had some lyrics. So I posted them on the forum where we met and she wrote and performed a song, which was the unique experience in my life. I never happened to meet the author in person, as she lived in Moscow and I lived in Vladikavkaz and I never had time to go meet her when in Moscow. In any case here is the song, sung in Ossetian (South Ossetian dialect):
http://ironau.ru/khaebic/alolaj.mp3
At the time I translated the same text into English as well and here is the text
Award for you is hidden in my breast
And trying to break out every day
Nobody dares to touch its nest,
“It’s only made for her”- I say.
I frankly talk to you with glances,
You don’t allow me utter words,
I’m tirelessly seeking chances
And hope to see at least the buds.
I often want to bring a star for you,
Present to you unearthly light,
But you’re the brightest on any sky
And prize for you is kept in hide
This is a rather popular video on Russian web now, in Russian: ”Встань за Веру, Русская земля.” It is a beautifully sung military march dating back to as early as 1912, called “Farewell of the Slav [Woman]“. It was inspired by wars in the Balkans at the time.I somewhat feel uneasy though about its popularity and wording in current circumstances. It is about going to war, defending Russian soil and Russian-Orthodox faith. Russia is not at war and it doesn’t appear anyone is going to war with Russia, so why this war music is so popular? Is it perhaps because Russians feel at war with modernity even though there is no actual war? Or perhaps because WWII memories are still especially vivid in Russia and seen as the time of glory? In the light of growing Russian nationalism and xenophobia this video sounds to me almost ominous. I might be wrong, but the timing, the wording, its popularity and its content suggest it is a worrying sign. from www.youtube.com posted with vodpod
Lie in Russian politics
Kovalev is right saying how endemic have become the Russian authorities’ invariable tactics of lie. This eventually leads to rise of cynicism among all people, corruption etc. But I wonder how much lie is permissible, after all politicians around the world lie almost all the time. So what is the crucial difference?I would say that in Russia politicians are never held responsible for conscious lying. Lie is not perceived as a crime or shameful thing to do, lie is not only a way of building a career and a way of survival, but also genuine customary way of life in Russian politics with no one to challenge it as the opposition has practically faded away.Russians’ own great writer Fyodor Dostoyevsky indicated in his unusual short story “Dream of the funny person” how grave lie’s consequences can be. But even though Russian leadership quotes Russian classics all the time, they must have missed reading some short stories.
The lie which you so decisively have again established in government use and which you are incapable of rejecting has an important and extremely dangerous quality – I would say a particularly corrupting force. The point is that the majority of your listeners don’t believe you, and that includes your convinced supporters. That is, they are of course pleased with “United Russia’s” victory, but they understand very well whatever you say how the mould for such a victory was set.We have a paradoxical change – you lie, your listeners know this and you know that they don’t believe you, only pretend to believe, and yet they also know that you know they don’t believe you. Everybody knows everything. The very lie no longer aspires to deceive anyone, from being a means of fooling people it has for some reason turned into an everyday way of life, a customary and obligatory rule for living. You have a Mr Markov, supposedly a professor, supposedly a political expert, and in fact a hardened and dense cynic. Speaking with him about our “politics”, a journalist said: “lies have short legs”. “Human memory is even shorter”, was Markov’s response. Horrible, yet it would seem that this is in fact the case. Of course they’ll forget a lot about the two grubby spectacles in succession in a couple of months after 2 March. However they’ll never forget something else – that the top figures of the state lie through their teeth. And how could they forget when lying is your natural element?This memory is catastrophic and its results irreparable because the customary lies of leaders always generate and cultivate cynicism in society and cannot achieve anything else. Whatever your people now say about freedom being better than lack of freedom, about the right to self-expression and so forth, these pompous speeches are fixedly (and fairly, by the way) perceived as a continuation of your untruth. They’re mere words. There is exactly the same attitude to the bombastic ambitiousness of your utterances about the guaranteed phenomenal and swiftest successes in all conceivable areas, matters and issues.
I would say that Ukraine is of course part of the broader game and its surrounding situation sheds light on why American-Russian relations are so bad. I asked one day myself why actually there is so much tension between the US and Russia (obviously bilateral relations occupy much greater space in Russian political agenda, than in the US’s) and found a very simple answer. It is not about democracy in Russia, it is not about human rights, it is not about war in Iraq or other similar nice things aired all the time. It is about Russian “quest for greatness” that drives Russia to exert power on its neighbours and beyond and possibly to recreate sort of USSR and it is US’s fear that this might actually happen that define the logic of the struggle. Of course, if Russia were a democracy (so the causes of deterioration of US-Russia relations, that I previously dismissed as obsolete are not entirely such) US’s fear of Russia would be much lower, but as it is the US is uneasy about possible consolidation of yet another Russian empire and so are Russia’s neighbours, including CIS countries themselves.
Geopolitical Diary: Ukraine, The Main Battlefield of Cold War II
March 28, 2008
Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko said on Thursday that no NATO bases would be deployed in his country in the event that Kiev became a member of that organization. Citing Ukraine’s Constitution, which forbids the establishment of foreign military bases in the country, Yushchenko said, “Some people are spreading the fable that there will be a NATO military base in Sevastopol.
Talking to Russian students I told them that expert community in the US widely believes that Russia is trying to use its nuclear potential as a means of boosting its international standing. Nuclear weapons is one of the few fields in which Russia still wields unquestionable (or at least considerable) capability. So by constantly poking the nukes (not only in regard to its own weapons, but also in a wider sense trying to speculate about non-prolifiration issues, Iran, etc.) Russians try to re-establish themselves as a world power. In any case, of course Russia is a world power, but not quite in the same sense as USSR was and Russian leadership and Russian people nowadays regularly lament this fact.
I have not come across of proper understanding of the Russian tactics in this field though (I am not saying there is no understanding of this, I just have not heard it explicitly stated, it is a very simple idea, of course) The strategy of boosting Russia’s importance with nuclears is a double edge sword. It is important for the US to pay serious attention to Russian nuclear weapons in any case, but especially so if Russia is an adversarial country. In this case it is really necessary to court Russia into new agreements and try to reduce the possibility of the nuclear war, etc. But Russia is not the US’s adversary or at least Russia does not say that explicitly. So why the US should care about Russian nuclear weapons, if they are not spearheaded against the US or its allies? (especially as they are gradually decaying, if the reports got it right)
If, however, Russia still wants to use the nuclear talks with the US as a way of boosting its ego (I think it is an enourmously appropriate word here), then things should be cleared up: Russia is an adversary country. But Russians do not really want to be US’s adversaries. Russian leadership wants to use US’s tarnished image to scare its own population for internal political reasons, but they don’t want to be held responsible for that.
This video is co-produced by Memorial Human Rights Center, Grozny, Chechnya and WITNESS (2007). “Counter-terrorism operations” conducted by Russian military and security forces in Chechnya since 1999 have resulted in the enforced disappearances of over 3,000 people who remain missing. Due to the lack of adequate investigation and prosecution, the problem has spread to the neighboring republics in the North Caucasus. MISSING LIVES addresses the culture of impunity surrounding these abductions and the damage done in the lives of people whose loved have vanished. The video provides insight into the struggle of relatives trying to break through the system of lawlessness to seek information and redress for the crimes of enforced disappearances, torture, and extra-judicial killings.
Beginning of April NATO summit in Bucharest will decide about another round of the organisation’s enlargement. While it is widely expected that some small countries in the Balkans (like Albania and Croatia) will be given NATO membership, the big question is whether Ukraine and Georgia are going to get Membership Accession Plan (MAP). MAP normally sets out definite time and actions framework for a country to be given NATO membership.
In the particular case of Ukraine and Georgia Russia is fiercely opposed to the anticipated move. My suspicion is that Russians not so much fear NATO (that is what they state), as they grudge the fact that their former satellites are slipping out of their control. Even Vladimir Putin (as well as George W. Bush) is going to visit the summit. My guess is that Putin really thinks that he owns such a special kind of personality that he is able to scare off the West from giving MAP to Ukraine and Georgia by being present at the sammit and emanating fierce looks and speeches. My another guess is that the West is tempted to teach Putin a lesson, even though it does not really need either Ukraine or Georgia for military and security purposes much.
In the meanwhile Wednesday 19 March president Bush promised to support Georgian bid for NATO membership at the meeting with president of Georgia Mikhail Saakashvili. Immediately afterwards 21 March Russian state’s Duma issued a statement calling on the Russian government to consider recognition of Georgian breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Daniel Fried, Assistant Secretary in the Department of State, has warned that such a move would lead to grave consequencies.
Some people (like Mr Fried above) paid a lot of attention to the Russian parliament’s statement. But one has to bear in mind, that Russian parliament is not a separate branch of power, moreover, it is currently not branch of power at all. It is just governmental body that carries out tasks set for it by president’s administration. Their message was very basic and clear this time, “if Georgia gets MAP, we will recognise South Ossetia and Abkhazia.” However, as Russians have threatened to recognise these regions in response to Kosovo’s recognition by the West, but then did not, credibility of their threats have significantly diminished.
I have little doubt that even after Georgia gets MAP, Russians will not recognise Georgian breakaway regions, but will just continue trying to keep the uncertain situation there as long as possible.Only serious pressure from the West could make Russia go, but obviously the issue at stake for the West is still too small in order to apply much pressure (its significance might grow though over the next year or two). On the other hand Russians will be pushed to do something decisive by both internal hawks and western advancement, and their very undecidedness will contribute to the damage to their reputation.
Why Russians are so reluctant to do something decisive about these regions is also fairly clear. Until Abkhazia and South Ossetia are in an uncertain status, Russians can meddle in Georgian affairs and through Georgia actually try to influence the West as well (as it tried to use this factor in trade offs in the Balkans). As soon as Russians recognise these territories, they are going to lose this leverage, while receiving very little in return (South Ossetia and Abkhazia are rather poor territories with few resources) and as a supplement Russia will be viewed by the West and CIS countries as an aggressor. This will contribute to the country’s isolation almost inevitably. If Russians just leave Abkhazia and South Ossetia, it is going to be understood as a sign of weakness inside Russia and in the Caucasus and will also have negative repercussions for the country. (I have written about this in more detail earlier: http://eng.kavkaz.memo.ru/analyticstext/enganalytics/id/1207071.html )
So this dilemma is a rather tough one for Russia’s leadership, especially as currently Russia has such aspirations for global leadership and so called quest for greatness. On the other hand, Russia’s quest for greatness should not necessarily be everybody’s concern. Help to keep up stability in the region comes from an unexpected side. China is creeping into Georgia as well, this might further curb scope of Russia’s possible actions in the region. In any case Georgia and its breakaway regions are almost certain to become sources of important news in the next 1-2 years and probably beyond.
“President George W. Bush said on Wednesday he had no regrets about the unpopular war in Iraq despite the “high cost in lives and treasure” and declared that the United States was on track for victory.”
http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSN1929611920080319
I wonder if president Bush could avoid saying whether he regrets about war in Iraq or not. Otherwise it appears that he does not care either about “lives or treasures”. He may not care indeed, but why announce this aloud, I don’t understand.
I went to a talk on US-Russia relations given by a MGIMO professor. Thinking of MGIMO as a top Russian institute preparing diplomats for the country’s foreign service, I expected to hear a well structured message at the very least. Instead the professor with rather poor command of English (!) told the audience number of funny things. I only wonder whether she really thought somebody would believe what she was saying or just perceived her talk as a burden and therefore didn’t care.
She said, there is no anti-Americanism in Russia, it is only “criticism” of the US policies in Iraq and elsewhere. I thought rewording Russian anti-Americanism into criticism did not really reflected the reality. President Putin has been very critical of the US, going as far as comparing it to the Third Reich and so has been the Russian media which is largely governed by the Kremlin. Anti-Americanism in Russia is a state-promoted propaganda and the modern cliches are strikingly similar to those used during soviet times. In regard to Iraq it is especially funny, because nobody cares about Iraq or Iraqi people in Russia. What Russia cares about is the US’s failure in Iraq, seeing it as Russia’s gain.
Another funny thing she said was that Russia needs to develop its regions and she expects the West, the US foremost to provide assistance to do that. This idea is always on Russian lips: “give us the money, but do not try to teach us all this stuff about democracy, because it’s all lie, we trust only in hard currency”.
The professor did not find last elections in Russia any different from the previous ones – “young people did not go to vote”, that is all she could say about the elections in which several presidential candidates were openly harassed by the state authorities and Putin’s handpicked successor Medvedev had practically no contenders.
She said a lot of not very meaningful words about Russia and the US having to cooperate and responsibilities and need to overcome disagreements, etc. She said, there would be no Russian military reaction to possible NATO’s enlargement into Ukraine and Georgia on Russian side (Putin said, however, that Russia strongly objected against it and could consider targeting military objects in Ukraine). At this point I felt she imagined herself to be on a “mission” that did not allow her to speak more openly, she apparently could not afford to say even as much as the president of Russia and numerous Russian experts have stated. Well, this is what I call a very strange perception of political expertise.
