Greatness is an odd word because it signifies both quantity and quality. In the case of Russia, the two are easily confused. Even after the huge territorial losses incurred with the Soviet collapse, Russia still accounts for one-seventh of the Earth’s surface. Therefore, it has a geographical imperative to think big. Russia is unlike Britain and France, which shrank back to their middle-sized home nations after losing their […]
Remember Aleksandr Bastrykin’s “forest scandal“? In light of the horrors Leonid Razvozzhayev says he endured, merely hauling a journalist out into the woods and threatening his life looks positively quaint. Bastrykin has managed to survive — and indeed thrive — amid not just the forest incident, but also the revelations about his unreported properties and business dealings in Europe. And his sharp […]
Ukraine‘s parliamentary election on Sunday will be neither free nor fair. After eight unproductive years since the 2004 Orange Revolution, the democratic opposition is depressed and demoralized. Even so, the elections may check President Viktor Yanukovych‘s power. Yanukovych came to power in February 2010 in elections that were rated free and fair. This was a time when Freedom House still ranked Ukraine as democratic. But Yanukovych […]
Those who sincerely believe the conspiracy theory about a U.S.-funded color revolution in Russia may have felt relieved when the Foreign Ministry kicked out USAID, a major donor of the country’s nongovernmental organizations, on Oct. 1. But now, according to “Anatomy of a Protest 2,” aired last Friday on government-controlled NTV television, there is still reason to be concerned. The pseudo-documentary warns darkly that the revolution against the Kremlin […]
When news of Russian Prsident Vladimir Putin’s October visit to Pakistan raised eyebrows all around, a Russian diplomat’s throwaway line over how mistaken one was, and that, in fact, Pakistan and Russia had a lot more in common than everyone thought, seemed more wishful thinking than fact. That India and Russia could be on opposite […]
Russian President Vladimir Putin turns 60 on Sunday, his grip on power weaker than in the past but under little immediate threat if the oil price stays high. Adoring supporters will celebrate in cities from Siberia to Rostov-on-Don in southern Russia, where the ruling party‘s loyal Young Guard will unfurl a banner on a bridge which […]
Regional elections, which will be held in less than two weeks, will be the first since the State Duma elections last December that sparked the mass protest movement. They are important for the opposition and for society as a whole. Both are rousing from a state of lethargy and calling for a more open, fair and competitive political system and for the authorities to heed its demands. The authorities are afraid […]
Soviet leaders had a poor record of keeping their promises. Nikita Khrushchev’s pronouncement that Communism would be fully implemented by 1980, or Mikhail Gorbachev’s pledge to give every family its own apartment by 2000, only provided more fodder for political jokes. Dmitri Medvedev’s assertion, at a meeting with Western Kremlinologists in September 2009, that direct […]
Georgian billionaire Bidzina Ivanishvili’s opposition coalition unexpectedly won the most votes in a parliamentary election yesterday, dealing a blow to U.S.-backed President Mikheil Saakashvili. Ivanishvili’s Georgian Dream group took the most ballots for party lists, according to some exit polls, while Saakashvili’s United National Movement claimed a stronger performance in single-member districts. The parliamentary majority […]
The 2012 U.S. presidential election presents a contrast to the 2008 election in terms of their perceptions by the Russian elite. In 2008, then-President Dmitry Medvedev expressed a desire to work with a “modern” U.S. leader rather than one “whose eyes are turned back to the past.” He was referring to Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama. But influential Russian elites voiced their support for the Republican candidate, John McCain, despite […]
looking beyond borders 