Window On Eurasia: Assassination Attempt In Ingushetia Threatens Medvedev’s Broader Policies
|
posted by eagle on June, 2009 as ANALYSIS / OPINION
Paul Goble
Vienna, June 23 – The assassination attempt against Ingush President Yunus-Bek Yevkurov, an action that Russian President Dmitry Medvedev views as a direct challenge to his own cadres policy, has prompted him to change course in ways that point to more violence, instability, and human rights violations in the North Caucasus.
As Moscow commentator Tatyana Stanovaya pointed out today, it is “obvious” that Medvedev views the attempt as an attack on his policies, given that the Russian president had insisted on Yevkurov’s appointment despite opposition from Vladimir Putin who was reluctant to oust his unpopular chekist predecessor (www.politcom.ru/8379.html).
Not only did Medvedev devote almost his entire working day yesterday to the Yevkurov case – summoning top security officials, ordering a harsh response to the perpetrators, and visiting the Ingush leader in a Moscow hospital – but the Russian leader took an action which casts doubt on his “liberal” reputation and points to a ...
comments (0)
StrategyPage: The Usual Suspects
|
posted by eagle on as ANALYSIS / OPINION
The Usual Suspects
June 20, 2009: The global economic recession is hitting Russia hard (because it is so dependent on raw materials exports, especially oil and gas.) The GPD was down 9.5 percent in the first quarter, and industrial output shrank 17 percent last month. The government now expects GDP to shrink 6-8 percent for the year. But current budgets are based on a 2.2 percent drop. So more cuts in spending are mandatory, and the defense budget will not be immune.Counter-terrorism operations in the Caucasus have left over a hundred people dead, wounded or under arrest so far this month. The violence down there is partly due to Islamic terrorism, but most of it is caused by the fact that the Caucasus has always been full of troublesome people. Russia took over the area in the 19th century as part of an effort to stop the raiding into southern Russia. The usual suspects are still at it. Several retired officers have come forward and pointed out ... >> full
comments (0)
Window On Eurasia: A New and More Dangerous ‘Red Belt’ Emerges In Russia
|
posted by eagle on as ANALYSIS / OPINION
Paul Goble
Vienna, June 20 – A new “red belt” is emerging in Russia, the result of the coming together of economic problems, political difficulties between Moscow and the regions, and ethnic challenges to central control, according to a new map of social tensions drawn up by a leading Russian news service.
But this map, which shows a broad swath of Russia between the North Caucasus and the Pacific, is incomplete, according to Arina Morokova of the New Region agency which compiled it, because the powers that be in many regions have succeeded in suppressing the kind of information needed for an accurate display (www.nr2.ru/moskow/237248.html).
Aleksandr Kynyev, one of the experts the agency consulted, identified as “hot red points” in Russia as including Leningrad oblast, Altai kray, Kamchatka, Primorsky kray, Irkutsk, Chelyabinsk and Sverdlovsk oblasts and Udmurtia. In his view, people in these places are ready to “block roads and [engage in other] ...
comments (0)
Window On Eurasia: Better-Moscow Teenagers More Inclined Than Poorer Ones To View US As Russia's Enemy, Survey Finds
|
posted by eagle on as ANALYSIS / OPINION
Paul Goble
Vienna, June 19 – Nearly half of Muscovite teenagers in relatively well-off family circumstances currently view the United States as an enemy of Russia, a view that fewer than a quarter of the poorest and most disadvantaged members of that age cohort share, according to a new survey conducted by researchers at Moscow’s Higher School of Economics.
That finding based on interviews with 300 young people, half of whom were in sufficiently stable family circumstances to be attending schools and half were “children of the streets,” calls into question the widespread assumption that rising incomes by themselves will promote positive international images.
Instead, the researchers suggest, these attitudes reflect the power of the electronic media to form the opinions of those most heavily exposed to it – children in relatively well-off circumstances – as opposed to the power of personal experience which tends to explain the ...
comments (0)
Prague Watchdog: The Choice Is Not Yet Made
|
posted by eagle on as ANALYSIS / OPINION
The choice is not yet madeBy Valery Dzutsev, special to Prague Watchdog Maryland, U.S.A. Reply to Sergei Gligashvili 
In his article The choice of unfreedom, Sergei Gligashvili puts his finger very neatly on the point of contact between the jihadism of Dokka Umarov’s Caucasus Emirate quasi-state and the version of post-Ichkerian Chechnya headed by Ramzan Kadyrov. The dilemma for Chechens who have not yet made up their minds is indeed not an enviable one. Like Mr. Gligashvili, I believe that were Russia to leave the North Caucasus today, this would not automatically lead to the establishment of a just and free political system in the region. Moreover, it is quite possible that of the two evils – Kadyrov and Umarov – the people of Chechnya would choose Kadyrov, as Islamist theocracy, at least in its Umarov form, is incompatible with any freedoms, public or private. On the other hand, Kadyrov’s dictatorship may evolve into a more flexible political system through unification with ... |
>> full
comments (0)
|
