Press Release
Russia in Review: a digest of useful news from U.S.-Russia Initiative to Prevent Nuclear Terrorism for the week of June 8-15, 2012
Russia in Review: a digest of useful news from U.S.-Russia Initiative to Prevent Nuclear Terrorism for the week of June 8-15, 2012
I. U.S. and Russian priorities for the bilateral agenda.
Nuclear security agenda:
· The Energy Department announced Wednesday that it was stepping in to shore up USEC, calling the rescue vital to maintaining nuclear weapons and national security. (New York Times, 06.13.12).
Iran nuclear issues:
· During his urgent visit to Tehran on Wednesday Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Iran’s foreign minister Ali Akbar Salehi expressed optimism over the June 18 nuclear talks in Moscow between Iran and world powers aimed at resolving Iran’s disputed nuclear program. They also castigated the United States on Wednesday for its support of opposition forces battling President Bashar al-Assad and his military. (Itar-Tass, New York Times, 06.14.12).
· Iran’s top nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili says proposals from Iran and the six world powers will be on the agenda at the next round of talks in Moscow next week. (AP, 06.13.12).
· Iran has received space operations systems relevant to potential missile construction from the Russian government-linked arms firm Rosoboronexport. (GSN, 06.11.12).
NATO-Russia cooperation, including transit to Afghanistan:
· Rosoboronexport and the United States Department of Defense are in talks over an additional supply of Mikoyan Mi-17V5 helicopters for the needs of the Afghan army, company's spokesman Vyacheslav Davidenko said. (Interfax, 06.14.12).
· The House version of the defense authorization bill contained an amendment ordering the Government Accountability Office to investigate the Defense Department’s contract to buy 21 Mi-17 helicopters from Rosoboronexport for the Afghan armed forces and why it was awarded on a "no-bid" basis. (LA Times, 06.10.12.)
Counter-terrorism cooperation:
· No significant developments.
Missile defense:
· Russia is entirely capable of delivering an appropriate reaction to the deployment by the US of a European missile defence system, but, even so, Moscow would prefer to see all these plans reviewed, Russian President Vladimir Putin said. (Interfax, 06.14.12).
Nuclear arms control:
· Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee Carl Levin called on the Obama administration on Thursday to seek cuts in nuclear warheads far beyond the requirements of current treaties. “I can’t see any reason for having as large an inventory as we are allowed to have under New Start, in terms of real threat, potential threat,” Mr. Levin said during a breakfast meeting with correspondents. (New York Times, 06.14.12).
· The US Air Force is considering bringing back mobile basing for ICBMs in its Analysis of Alternatives for a Minuteman Follow-on. (Arms Control Wonk, 06.14.12).
Cyber security:
· No significant developments.
Energy exports from CIS:
· Russian energy company Rosneft and U.S. oil giant Exxon Mobil signed an agreement Friday on joint development of an oil deposit in western Siberia. Russia, having slipped behind Saudi Arabia last year as the biggest crude producer, is looking to use Exxon's hydraulic fracturing technology in a venture with the Kremlin-run oil company OAO Rosneft to wring "tight oil" from the Bazhenov shale formation in west Siberia. They plan pilot wells to locate deposits that Rosneft said may hold 13.2 billion barrels of oil, a prospect needed for Russia to keep supplying 16 percent of global exports another decade. (Xinhua, 06.15.12, Bloomberg, 06.14.12)
Access to major markets for exports and imports:
· A bipartisan group of U.S. senators introduced legislation Tuesday that would scrap the Jackson-Vanik amendment, saying it's necessary as Russia joins the WTO. Democrat Max Baucus, who chairs the Senate Finance Committee, promised to attach [the bill] to the Magnitsky bill which proposes sanctions against Russian officials deemed to have committed human rights violations. (AFP, FP, 06.12.12).
· Russian authorities promised "complex, multi-dimensional and extremely stern retaliation" if the US approves the so-called Magnitsky bill, adding that the reply would hurt US businesses and all facets of relations between the two countries. (Russia Today, 06.15.12).
Other bilateral issues:
· Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton's accusation that Russia "dramatically" escalated the crisis in Syria lost steam Thursday when the State Department acknowledged that the helicopters she accused Moscow of sending were actually refurbished ones already owned by the Assad regime. A statement posted on the Russian Foreign Ministry Web site on Friday confirmed that Moscow had refurbished helicopters for the Syrian military but denied shipping new models. (AP, 06.14.12, New York Times, 06.15.12).
· Russia’s foreign minister said Friday that Moscow isn’t discussing Syria’s future without President Bashar Assad as Washington has claimed. Sergei Lavrov, who met with the State Department’s No. 2 official William Burns in Kabul on Thursday, maintained that Russia believes it’s up to the Syrians to determine their country’s future and said foreign players shouldn’t meddle. (AP, 06.15.12).
· A U.S. official said Russia had been assured that “our interest is in stabilizing the situation (in Syria), not eliminating Russian influence.” (NYT, 06.14.12.)
· Andrei Klimov of the Duma's committee on international affairs says that many of Russia's neighbours are "troublemakers" but that the Americans often "propose solutions to deal with these troublemakers that make the troubles even worse.” (Economist, 06.12.12).
· Washington used to support "democratic revolutions" in several countries, but Obama's administration is not following the line, says U.S. ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul. (Russia Today, 06.13.12).
· An inter-agency U.S.-Russian commission for prisoners of war (POWs), internees, and missing soldiers met in St. Petersburg on Saturday after a three-year break. (Interfax, 06.13.12).
II. Russia news.
Domestic Politics, Economy and Energy:
· As he addressed a reception gathered to celebrate Russia Day, President Vladimir Putin made it quite clear that changes to the political situation in the country must be evolutionary rather than revolutionary. In particular, the president said that people must "listen to and respect each other, strive for mutual understanding and look for compromises." Putin also spoke of economic, political, and social modernization. (Izvestia, 06.13.12, Vedomosti, 06.13.12).
· Vladimir Putin, Russia's president, on Friday signed a law which drastically raises fines on unsanctioned demonstrations, part of a crackdown on protests witnessed since his inauguration on May 7. (Financial Times, 06.08.12).
· Leaders of Russia’s opposition said Friday they were being questioned for a second time just days after tens of thousands marched in Moscow’s largest protest since President Vladimir Putin’s return to the Kremlin. Thousands of protesters gathered on the Russia Day in Moscow to denounce the government of President Vladimir Putin. Police raided the apartments of a dozen or more activists Monday morning, seizing documents, ordering opposition leaders in for questioning. (AP, 06.15.12, Washington Post, 06.12.12).
· Russian authorities said Sunday that they had arrested five more people in a continuing investigation of clashes between protesters and riot police officers at a demonstration on May 6. (New York Times, 06.10.12).
· Thirteen new political parties have been already registered with the Russian ministry of justice, thus bringing the overall number of official parties to 20. (Itar-Tass, 06.14.12).
· Russia is now in 153rd place out of 158 nations ranked according to the "absence of violence," said the Global Peace Index (GPI) 2012 published on Tuesday by the Sydney-based Institute for Economics and Peace. (Russia Profile, 06.13.12).
· Russia's economy grew last quarter at the fastest pace since the three months ended September 2011 as retail sales outweighed slower production in mining. Gross domestic product expanded 4.9 percent from the same period last year after rising 4.8 percent in the fourth quarter. (Bloomberg. 06.14.12).
· The International Monetary Fund (IMF) forecasts Russian GDP growth at 4 percent in 2012. (Interfax, 06.13.12).
· Practically all of the measures contained in Russia's competition development program have either been delayed or frozen, head of the Anti-Monopoly Service Igor Artemyev said. (Interfax, 06.14.12)
· British oil giant BP plans to remain involved with Russia despite looking to sell its stake in its TNK-BP joint venture, the Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday citing BP CEO Robert Dudley. (RIA Novosti, 06.14.12.)
Defense:
· The Russian Air Force will receive over 600 new planes and 1,000 helicopters by 2020, President Vladimir Putin said. "Total allocations for state defense orders will amount to 20 trillion rubles before 2020, and more than 4 trillion rubles or a quarter of all funds will be spent on aviation," he said. (Interfax, 06.04.12).
· Missile units armed with Topol, Topol-M, and the state-of-the-art Yars ground mobile missile systems on June 14 will start the first in the summer training period [of] combat patrols and practicing aspects of combat duty in field positions. (Interfax, 06.14.12).
· The Kavkaz 2012 military exercise will focus on the use of modern command methods and weaponry in a departure from the scenario for the previous Kavkaz event, in 2009. Kavkaz 2012 will be held from September 17–23 in the Southern Military District, with over 7,500 personnel and 300 various hardware assets taking part. (Interfax, 06.10.12).
· Russia intends to carry out significant updates to two Project 971 submarines that carry nuclear-tipped cruise missiles. (GSN, 06.14.12).
Security and law-enforcement:
· Russia’s top investigator Alexander Bastrykin denied Thursday that he threatened to kill investigative reporter Sergei Sokolov over a story that lambasted his agency, but apologized for an “emotional outburst” with the journalist. (AP, 06.14.12).
Foreign affairs:
· Russia's foreign minister Sergei Lavrov has made clear that Iran should not be excluded from an international conference on Syria–putting it on a collision course with the U.S. over the stalled peace process. (Financial Times, 06.09.12).
· The secretary general of the NATO alliance, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, said on Monday that the wars in the Balkans in the 1990s illustrated what might befall Syria unless Russia and the West agreed on a “unified, clear message” to the Syrian government to stop the violence. (New York Times, 06.11.12).
· A new poll held by Levada Center suggests that Russians think the friendliest country is Belarus. Apart from Belarus, which 34 percent of the respondents think of as a close ally, the respondents also said they think such countries as Kazakhstan (28 percent), Germany (17 percent) and China (16 percent) are friendly to Russia. The list of the most hostile states is headed by Georgia (41percent of respondents named it). Then come the U.S. (35 percent), Latvia (26 percent), and Lithuania (25 percent). (Gazeta.ru, 06.14.12).
· Ivica Dacic, the potential kingmaker in forming the next Serbian government, said Thursday that Russia is urging him to hammer out a coalition with nationalists and ditch his alliance with the Democrats, the country’s main pro-European Union party. (AP, 06.14.12).
Russia's neighbors:
· The National Nuclear Security Administration announced that the U.K. Global Threat Reduction Programme will provide the U.S. $3.5 million to support efforts in Uzbekistan, Belarus, and Afghanistan. (NNSA, 06.14.12).
· The billionaire leader of Georgia’s opposition coalition, Bidzina Ivanishvili, says he will not pay multimillion-dollar fines imposed on him by the Tbilisi City Court. (RFE/RL, 06.14.12).
· Russia's Federal Migration Service says there are more than 9,000 Georgian citizens currently on Russian territory illegally. (RFE/RL, 06.14.12).
· The Belarusian government has denounced the U.S. decision to extend a “national emergency" over Washington's relations to Belarus. (RFE/RL, 06.15.12).
· The Peace Mission 2012 anti-terrorist exercises of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) have just ended in Tajikistan. (Interfax, 06.14.12).
· The head of Kazakhstan's border guards service, General Nurzhan Myrzaliev, has resigned in the wake of the mass killing of 14 border guards and a forest ranger at a remote outpost along the Kazakh-Chinese border. (RFE/RL, 06.13.12).
· Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych believes jailed ex-Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko "participated" in the murder of lawmaker Yevhen Shcherban. (RFE/RL, 06.13.12).
· Russian fighter jets are conducting an increasing number of training flights over Armenia, a military spokesman said Saturday, sending a clear warning that Russia could intervene at any moment should violence escalate further in the territorial dispute between Armenia and Azerbaijan. (New York Times, 06.10.12).