Russia in Review

I. U.S. and Russian priorities for the bilateral agenda.

Nuclear security agenda:

• A U.S. federal agent who ferries nuclear bombs around the U.S. allegedly threatened to kill a co-worker and got into physical fights with others—and bosses weren’t informed, an audit finds. (Center for Public Integrity, 04.10.15).

Iran nuclear issues:

• Sanctions imposed on Iran by a UN Security Council's resolution must be cancelled together with the signing of the agreement on Iran’s nuclear program, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov said on Friday. (Tass, 04.09.15).
• An interim agreement between six world powers and Iran on Tehran's nuclear program will not lead to a new arms race, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said in remarks published on Monday. "Iran will be the most checked and inspected country if the principles agreed in Lausanne are transferred into the language of practical agreements," he said. (Reuters, 04.06.15).
• "We reaffirmed the close coordination of our efforts to help reach a final agreement and settle the situation around the Iranian nuclear program," Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told a press conference after a meeting with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Moscow on Tuesday. (Interfax, 04.07.15).

NATO-Russia relations, including transit to and from Afghanistan:

• Russia is using its long-range bomber fleet to send a message to the US, and the general charged with protecting the U.S. homeland says those flights will continue, or even expand, in the coming months. “They are messaging us. They are messaging us that they are a global power," Adm. Bill Gortney told reporters Tuesday, before noting that "we do the same sort of thing. “We watch very carefully what they are doing," he said. "They are adhering to international standards that are required by all airplanes that are out there, and everybody is flying in a professional manner in their side and our side as we watch very closely." Gortney said Moscow has developed a "far more capable military than the quantitative, very large military that the Soviet Union had." (Defense News, The Hill, 04.07.15).
• Actions taken by the United States and NATO to conduct nuclear-related joint exercises contradict their obligations of nuclear security and non-proliferation in the Eurasia continent, a senior Russian diplomat said Friday.  "Continuing joint exercises, held by the U.S. and other NATO countries within the framework of the so-called nuclear sharing concept, contradict the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty," Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said at a meeting in the State Duma, the lower chamber of parliament.  (Xinhua, 04.10.15).
• The North Atlantic Treaty Organization, in an exercise playing out in 11 countries, made its first attempt this week to test its revamped rapid-reaction force, the alliance's highest-profile response to Moscow's aggressiveness in Ukraine and elsewhere. The goal was to see if the troops could be ready to board planes 48 hours after receiving an “order to move," as specified in a new NATO policy. (Wall Street Journal, 04.09.15).
• NATO, publicly citing an administrative effort to limit the size of delegations from ''partner nations'' like Russia, has capped the Russian delegation to the military alliance's headquarters in Brussels at 30 members. Western officials said the move also followed a confidential assessment by the alliance's Civilian Intelligence Committee that intelligence agents had been part of Russia's delegation. (New York Times, 04.10.15).

Missile defense:

• Assistant U.S. Secretary of State Frank A. Rose said: “the United States will continue to insist on having the flexibility to respond to evolving ballistic missile threats, free from obligations or other constraints that limit our BMD capabilities.” (State.gov, 04.07.17).

Arms control:

• Russia formally remains a party to the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE) and is ready to discuss a new arms control regime. "Allow me to emphasize that Russia has suspended its involvement in the CFE Treaty Joint Consultative Group but it has not seceded from the Treaty as a whole. Moscow is not rejecting dialogue; it is prepared to discuss a new regime of control over conventional armaments in Europe," head of the Russian delegation to the Vienna negotiations on military security and arms control Anton Mazur told reporters in Moscow on Friday. (Interfax, 04.10.15).
• State Duma is discussing the ratification of a protocol to the Central Asian Nuclear Weapon Free Zone treaty. The protocol, signed by the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council last May, obliged them not to use nuclear weapons in the region. According to Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, it is doubtful that the protocol would be ratified by the United States. (Xinhua, 04.10.15).

Counter-terrorism agenda:

• The same jurors who found Dzhokhar Tsarnaev guilty on Wednesday of all 30 charges stemming from the deadly attack and its aftermath must now decide whether the 21-year-old should die for his crimes or spend the rest of his life in prison. The jurors will reconvene in federal court as early as next week to hear an estimated two weeks of testimony in the case's penalty phase. (Wall Street Journal, 04.09.15).

Cyber security:

• The White House is declining to name the source of a hack to its unclassified e-mail system amid reports that it came from Russia.  CNN and Bloomberg reported that U.S. officials believe Russia was behind the attack that also affected the State Department. Russian President Vladimir Putin's spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, dismissed the report, saying that "Russia is blamed for everything." (RFE/RL, 04.09.15).
• Three former U.S. intelligence officers who worked on counterintelligence and cyber operations told The Daily Beast that a new report this week accusing Russia of infiltrating unclassified networks at the White House was apparently designed to send a message to the Kremlin: We know what you’re up to, and how you’re doing it. (The Daily Beast, 04.08.15).
• Russia has begun development of a new Doctrine of Information Security for the country, the Russian Security Council press service announced Tuesday. “The actualization of approaches to protect national interests in the information sphere, considering today's reality, will be the basis of the project of the new redaction of the Doctrine," the Security Council said in a statement. (Sputnik, 04.07.15).
• The Kremlin, including the presidential website, routinely deals with hundreds and sometimes thousands of cyber-attacks every day, presidential press secretary Dmitry Peskov said. (Interfax, 04.08.15).
• Online auction giant eBay has become the first U.S. company to say it will accede to controversial and potentially costly legislation requiring web companies to store Russian users' data in Russia, newspaper Kommersant reported Tuesday. (Moscow Times, 04.07.15).

Energy exports from CIS:

• Russian oil companies are diversifying slowly away from their dependence on the European Union. China is now the second largest single consumer of Russian oil after The Netherlands, replacing Germany. And Ukraine shipments have fallen by nearly half. Russia's total crude oil exports declined by 5.6% in 2014. Federal government revenues from export customs duties on crude oil amounted to 2.6 trillion rubles in 2014 compared with the 2.3 trillion rubles in 2013. (Forbes, 04.07.15).
• The European Union will host the next round of gas talks between Ukraine and Russia on April 14 in Berlin. Ukraine has asked for 1 billion cubic meters of gas imports from Russia in April, trebling the amount it received in March, Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak said Saturday. Russian President Vladimir Putin has met with the head of gas giant Gazprom and said Russia will not use the price of gas as an instrument to pressure Ukraine.  (AP, 04.05.15, Wall Street Journal, 04.07.15, RFE/RL, 04.08.15).

Bilateral economic ties:

• Ford Motor Co. on Friday said it would take a controlling interest in its Russian joint venture with Sollers OJSC, providing additional funding to the venture and opening the door for further integration at a time when Russian auto sales are plummeting. (Wall Street Journal, 04.10.15).

Other bilateral issues:

• Chairman of the State Duma Foreign Affairs Committee Alexei Pushkov and U.S. Ambassador to Russia John Tefft met in the State Duma on Thursday to discuss possible ways to improve relations between Moscow and Washington. "The parties also noted the destructive effect being caused by 'Cold War-'style rhetoric to bilateral relations," the committee said in a press release. (Interfax, 04.10.15).

II. Russia news.

Domestic politics, economy and energy:

• The Russian currency continued a recent run of strength Thursday, taking the ruble to fresh 2015 highs, as warnings multiplied that the gains were unjustified and could be reversed at any moment. The ruble rose 3.5 percent to 51.8 against the U.S. dollar in mid-afternoon in Moscow. The upward swing took the ruble's onward march against the dollar to nearly 9 percent this week alone, and to 37.5 percent since a 2015 low in late January.  (The Moscow Times, 04.09.15).
• State Duma passed amendments to the 2015 budget in third reading on Friday to approve increase of budget deficit from 0.6% to 3.7% of GDP. (Gazeta.ru, 04.10.15).
• Inflation in Russia slowed to 1.2% in March from 2.2% in February, 3.9% in January and 2.6% in December, the Federal State Statistics Service (Rosstat) said. Inflation in annual terms rose slightly to 16.9% in March this year, from 16.7% in February, 15% in January and 11.4% in December.  (Interfax, 04.06.15).
• Russia's car market shrank 42.5 percent this March as carmakers struggled with ruble devaluation, oncoming recession and a saturated market, according to market data released Wednesday. (The Moscow Times, 04.08.15).
• The head of the International Monetary Fund called on Thursday for more central bank easing, citing the prospect of a long period of weak global growth. IMF’s updated global economic forecast, scheduled to be released Tuesday, will downgrade the growth outlook for many major emerging-market economies, including Brazil and Russia. (Wall Street Journal, 04.10.15).
• The presidential administration received nearly 50,000 calls in the first hours after opening a phone hotline for questions ahead of President Vladimir Putin's call-in show on April 16, a presidential spokesman said, attributing the growth in demand to the “fateful” events of the past year. (The Moscow Times, 04.10.15).
• President Putin had fallen ill when he disappeared from public view for 11 days last month, Russian military and intelligence figures have told their US counterparts. According to a participant in a meeting of the Elbe Group, comprising senior but retired military officials from both sides: “A member acknowledged that Putin had been ill and that was the reason for his brief disappearance in early March. (Times, 04.01.15).

Defense and Aerospace:

• "The large-scale checks scheduled for this year will cover all military districts and all categories of troops. In addition, the Russian-Belarusian operational exercise Union Shield 2015 and the strategic exercise Centre 2015 will also go ahead," Russian President Vladimir Putin said. (Interfax/BBC, 04.09.15).
• Crews of Tupolev Tu-160, Tu-95MS and Tu-22MZ strategic and long-range bomber aircraft have destroyed mock targets within 2,000 to 7,000 kilometers from their air base, the Russian Defense Ministry said. (Interfax, 04.09.15).
• Firefighters have put out a blaze on a nuclear submarine that was undergoing repairs at a shipyard in province of Arkhangelsk on Tuesday. There were no weapons on board, the vessel's nuclear reactor had been shut down prior to the blaze and nobody was hurt, said the state-owned United Shipbuilding Corporation which runs the Zvyozdochka shipyard where the Antei (NATO classification Oscar-II) submarine was being repaired. (The Moscow Times, 04.08.15).
• Russia's Deputy Defense Minister Tatyana Shevtsova said April 9 there would be no reductions of personnel or funding for the Defense Ministry. Shevtsova said despite the sequester of the state budget there were no plans to cut any funding to the Defense Ministry. (RFE/RL, 04.09.15).
• The Defense Ministry will fill all junior officer positions in the Russian military with volunteer servicemen as Moscow continues to modernize and professionalize its military by reducing its dependence on conscripted troops. (The Moscow Times, 04.03.15).
• Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin said Monday he resolved a labor strike at the building site of Russia's $3 billion new spaceport in the Far East that has been plagued by corruption allegations and construction delays.  (The Moscow Times, 04.06.15).
• Russia’s fifth generation T-50 fighter will not participate in the May 9th parade. (Gazeta.ru, 04.10.15).

Security, law-enforcement and justice:

• The international terrorist organization Islamic State is beginning to embed itself in other terrorist groups, including those working on the territory of Russia, FSB Deputy Director Sergei Smirnov said. "The danger of the Islamic State is that they are beginning to embed themselves in other terrorist organizations. They are expressing an interest in the terrorist organization Imarat Kavkaz. Some field commanders of Imarat Kavkaz have vowed their allegiance to the Islamic State,” Smirnov said in Tashkent. (Interfax, 04.10.15).
• An Azerbaijani citizen living in Russia has been charged with financing militants in Syria, according to a report by Russia's Kommersant newspaper on April 6. FSB has filed criminal charges against Gachai Haciyev, an Azerbaijani who lives in the Lipetsk region of Russia. (RFE/RL, 04.08.15).
• Russian President Vladimir Putin declared that FSB had prevented three terrorist attacks, arrested over 120 gang members and "neutralized" 20, including three ringleaders this year. (Interfax/BBC, 04.09.15).
• President Vladimir Putin has submitted an amnesty proposal to the federal parliament that could free up to 60,000 prisoners, the Kremlin said Thursday.  (The Moscow Times, 04.09.15).
• Russia's Interior Ministry troops are conducting large-scale exercises involving a “full arsenal” of anti-riot weapons to practice suppressing political protests such as the one that toppled the pro-Russian administration of neighboring Ukraine last year. (The Moscow Times, 04.09.15).
• One of the suspects in the alleged murder of Aleksandr Litvinenko claims the former Russian spy may have killed himself accidentally. Speaking at a news conference in Moscow on April 8, Dmitry Kovtun described Litvinenko's death as an "accidental suicide."  (RFE/RL, 04.08.15).
• Russian media reported that a journalist Vyacheslav Starodubets who wrote about corruption in Russia’s troubled southern region of Dagestan was briefly kidnapped and badly beaten on April 5 in an attack that he has called retribution for his work.  (RFE/RL, 04.06.15).
• Corruption in Russia has swelled to levels “unimaginable” during the heydays of previous administrations, head of VTB 24 bank and former Finance Minister Mikhail Zadornov said on Tuesday. “The level of corruption that exists today in Russia — I, for one, absolutely could not imagine it even in 1989, in 1990, in 1998-99,” he said. (The Moscow Times, 04.08.15).
• The Russian parliament voted Tuesday to revoke immunity for opposition lawmaker Ilya Ponomaryov targeted in a case of alleged embezzlement, a move Kremlin critics denounced as an attempt to stifle political dissent. (Wall Street Journal, 04.07.15).

Foreign affairs and trade:

• Russian president Vladimir Putin and Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras have made a pledge to “restart and revive” bilateral relations in a meeting in Moscow. Russia is considering giving Greece funds based on future profits it could earn from shipping Russian gas to Europe as part of a pipeline extension, two Greek government sources said Wednesday. The extension to the Turkish Stream pipeline might also mean Athens would pay less for Russian gas. However, Mr Putin dashed hopes of an exemption for Greece from Russia’s import ban on western agricultural products and foodstuffs.  Earlier Russian Agriculture Minister Nikolai Fyodorov has said that the Russian government could consider removing Greece, Hungary and Cyprus from its ban on most Western food imports. (Reuters, 04.07.15, 04.09.15, Financial Times, 04.09.15).
• Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras told senior Russian lawmakers Thursday that Athens had played an active role in preventing an expansion of anti-Russia sanctions earlier this year. “We used the small force we have to help avoid further sectoral sanctions," said Mr. Tsipras in comments carried by Russian state news agencies. “You probably know that the position of the new Greek government is that sanctions don't lead anywhere, they're a dead end." (Wall Street Journal, 04.09.15).
• Twenty-five foreign leaders and heads of international organizations have confirmed they will attend the Victory Parade on Moscow's Red Square on May 9, presidential chief of staff Sergei Ivanov told the media on Saturday. (Interfax, 04.05.15).
• The Czech president has decided to skip a military parade during a visit to Moscow next month. Earlier Zeman said U.S. ambassador Andrew Schapiro is now unwelcome at his office because of the diplomat's recent doubts about whether the president's participation in the parade is wise. (RFE/RL, 04.10.15, Wall Street Journal, 04.05.15).
• Russia and the Red Cross appealed Saturday for a military pause in Yemen to allow urgent deliveries of humanitarian aid and evacuation of civilians after 10 days of Saudi-led airstrikes and fighting in which hundreds of people have died. (Washington Post, 04.05.15).
• Russia and China are discussing the construction of the seventh and eighth power units of the Tianwan nuclear power plant in China's Jiangsu Province, under the supervision of Russia's state nuclear corporation Rosatom. (Interfax, 04.07.15).
• Russia and Thailand plan to increase annual trade to $10 billion by 2016. Prime Minister Medvedev made this declaration during a meeting with the Prime Minister of Thailand Prayuth Chan-o-Cha on April 8. (RBTH, 04.10.15).
• Afghanistan is interested in buying Russian Mi-35 helicopters, Shakir Kargar, the Afghan president's special envoy on the CIS countries, said. (Interfax, 04.10.15).
• Five Nordic nations have agreed to work more closely on defense after declaring Russia the "biggest challenge to European security." The defense ministers of Sweden, Norway, Finland, Denmark and Iceland said Northern Europe must prepare for possible crises or incidents because of Russia. (RFE/RL, 04.10.15).
• Russian tycoon Mikhail Fridman will invest $16 billion in telecommunications and technology assets in Europe and the U.S. (Moscow Times, 04.06.15).
• Gazprom has said it plans to sell its 10.52 percent stake in Germany's natural gas supplier Verbundnetz Gas. (Reuters, 04.07.15).
• Russian investigators say they are unable to reach a final conclusion about what caused the 2010 plane crash that killed Polish President Lech Kaczynski and 95 others because Poland has not responded to requests for certain information. (AP, 04.09.15).

Russia's neighbors:

• Ukraine's President Petro Poroshenko says he is willing to hold a referendum leading to a more decentralized state. The Minsk ceasefire accord reached in February called for adoption of a new constitution by the end of 2015, including decentralization of power. "Decentralization has nothing to do with federalization," Mr Poroshenko told the new committee on Monday. "Ukraine was, is and I'm convinced will remain a unitary state." Russia-backed separatists on Monday balked at the idea of a referendum as offering too little. (BBC, AP, 04.06.15).
• Russian President Vladimir Putin in February turned down an offer from his Ukrainian counterpart Petro Poroshenko to “take Donbass,” asking Poroshenko whether he was “out of his mind,” Forbes reported. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov on Monday refused to comment on the Forbes report. A spokesman for Ukraine's Foreign Affairs Ministry, Yevhen Perebyinis, blamed a translation glitch for the reported miscommunication. (The Moscow Times, 04.06.15).
• Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov says he plans to meet with his counterparts from Ukraine, Germany, and France on April 13 to discuss the implementation of a deal meant to end the armed conflict in eastern Ukraine. Lavrov has proposed that both sides in the conflict in Ukraine withdraw weapons of under 100 mm caliber from the line of contact as a way of boosting confidence in a February cease-fire. (RFE/RL, 04.04.15, 04.09.15).
• At least six Ukrainian servicemen were killed in separatist attacks on Sunday in Ukraine's troubled eastern regions in a grim weekend marking the first anniversary of a rebellion Also army spokesman Andriy Lysenko said on April 8 that two soldiers had been killed and four wounded in the past day. (Reuters, 04.05.15,RFE/RL, 04.08.15).
• Pro-Russian separatists in Ukraine's eastern region of Donetsk have freed 16 Ukrainian captives. The release happened on April 6 and the separatists said that it was a unilateral gesture (RFE/RL, 04.06.15).
• Ukraine on Thursday drew up a new security doctrine denouncing Russia's "aggression" and setting its sights on joining the U.S.-led NATO military alliance. Oleksandr Turchynov, head of the national security council, told a session of the body that Ukraine saw Russian aggression as a "long-standing factor" and viewed NATO membership as "the only reliable external guarantee" of its sovereignty and territorial integrity. (Reuters, 04.09.15).
• Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk has announced the Ukrainian government's intention to sign a memorandum with NATO on cooperation in consultations, management, communications, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance as part of NATO's Partnership for Peace program. (Kyiv Post, 04.08.15).
• The deputy head of the Ukrainian presidential administration, Valeriy Chaly, visited Washington, where he met with members of the U.S. administration and non-governmental organizations. Chaly's meetings addressed Ukraine-U.S. relations and mechanisms for Washington's financial and defense assistance for Kiev. (Interfax, 04.07.15).
• The self-proclaimed Luhansk People's Republic says it will begin issuing passports to residents of areas controlled by pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine. (RFE/RL, 04.03.15).
• The Netherlands has published over 500 documents linked to the July 2014 MH17 flight crash in eastern Ukraine following a freedom of information request filed by several news outlets. (Sputnik, 04.09.15).
• Ukraine's parliament voted April 9 to ban "propaganda of the totalitarian Communist and Nazi regimes.” A high-ranking diplomat at Russia's Foreign Ministry on Sunday denounced Ukraine's proposed ban on promoting communism and Nazism, saying that by equating the two ideologies, Kiev was violating international law. (The Moscow Times, 04.05.15,RFE/RL, 04.09.15).
• Ukrainian authorities say they have detained more than 40 alleged members of a terror group in the Black Sea port city of Odesa. (RFE/RL, 04.10.15).
• The controversial leader of Ukraine's ultranationalist Right Sector paramilitary group has been named an army adviser. Ukrainian Armed Forces spokesman Oleksey Mazepa announced on April 6 that Dmytro Yarosh would "act as a link between volunteer battalions and the General Staff." (RFE/RL, 04.06.15).
• Ukraine's prosecutor-general says he has "invited" powerful oligarch Ihor Kolomoyskiy to answer questions regarding the attempted murder of a lawyer a decade ago. (RFE/RL, 04.10.15).
• The former director of Ukraine's State Financial Inspectorate, Mykola Hordiyenko, has accused the government led by Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk of corruption. A group of Ukrainian lawmakers blocked the parliament’s rostrum in the morning of April 7 to demand a probe into the work of the Cabinet and Yatsenyuk. Serhiy Kaplin, a member of Ukrainian parliament representing Petro Poroshenko Bloc, also initiated a rally in front of the parliament. (Kyiv Post, 04.07.15, Interfax, 04.08.15).
• New figures show that inflation in Ukraine during the first quarter of this year increased 20.3 percent compared to the January-March period in 2014, and that last month alone it rose by 45.8 percent. (RFE/RL, 04.06.15).
• Ukraine's parliament on Thursday backed a law aimed at breaking the stranglehold of powerful groups over the lucrative gas distribution sector and establishing fairer market conditions.(Reuters, 04.09.15).
• Investors holding $10 billion of Ukrainian debt have joined forces to develop a restructuring plan for the country's debt which won't involve a reduction in the value of the bonds. Ukraine is in talks with several countries to provide currency swap lines to boost the country's emergency cash reserves, the International Monetary Fund's No. 2 official, David Lipton, said Tuesday. (Wall Street Journal, 04.07.15, Wall Street Journal, 04.09.15).
• Russian forces on Thursday conducted a drill near Moldova, the small, Kremlin-menaced nation wedged between Ukraine and Romania. According to Russian news agencies, 400 Russian troops participated in exercises in Transnistria, a breakaway territory of Moldova populated by ethnic Russians. They fired 100,000 rounds of ammunition. (Wall Street Journal, 04.10.15).
• A fourth man has been charged in a terrorism case involving raising funds to send U.S. residents to join Islamic State fighters in Syria. Dilkhayot Kasimov, an Uzbek citizen living in New York, was named along with three previously charged defendants at a federal court in Brooklyn on April 6. (RFE/RL, 04.07.15).
• Kists, ethnic Chechens from Georgia's Pankisi Gorge, have called on the authorities in Tbilisi to put measures in place to stop local youth being recruited to fight alongside the Islamic State (IS) group in Syria. (RFE/RL, 04.07.15).
• Turkmenistan's embassy in the Belarusian capital, Minsk, has been hacked by people with apparent links to the Islamic State extremist group. (RFE/RL, 04.09.15).
• Uzbek President Islam Karimov has been sworn into office for a fourth term. The inauguration ceremony was held in parliament on April 10 and attended by the chairman of the Constitutional Court, cabinet ministers, and foreign diplomats. (RFE/RL, 04.10.15).
• Five leaders of an Armenian opposition group have been sent to pretrial detention. A spokeswoman for Armenia's Investigative Committee said that the five leaders of the Constituent Parliament group had been sent to pretrial detention for two months. (RFE/RL, 04.10.15).
• A Russian soldier who confessed to killing seven members of an Armenian family — including two small children — in their home in January has been declared sane following a psychiatric examination, the Interfax news agency reported Thursday. (The Moscow Times, 04.09.15).

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