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Diplomat says talks on North Korea to begin in late August

Posted on Monday 2 November 2009 at 09:23 AM - 2 Comments - Post Comment - Link

MOSCOW - A Russian diplomat said Monday that six-nation talks aimed at easing the tension surrounding North Korea's nuclear program will begin in Beijing in late August, the Interfax news agency reported.

Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Losyukov said in Beijing that talks will start in the final third of August - between Aug. 21 and Aug. 31 - and will involve deputy foreign ministers of the participating nations, Interfax reported.

"This level will set the tone and promote constructive work at the negotiations," Interfax quoted Losyukov as saying after a meeting with a Chinese diplomat on the talks that officials hope will defuse a 10-month standoff over U.S. allegations that Pyongyang is trying to freshwater pearl jewelry develop nuclear weapons in violation of a 1994 agreement.

North Korea, which had pressed for bilateral negotiations with the United States, recently agreed to talks with the United States, China, Russia, Japan and South Korea to discuss the standoff. "North Korea has been showing encouraging flexibility lately," Interfax quoted Losyukov as saying.

Losyukov said a North Korean deputy foreign minister would arrive in Moscow on Wednesday for consultations with Russian diplomats, Interfax reported. Russian diplomats will hold separate consultations with a South Korean deputy foreign minister the same day, he said.

A Chinese diplomat said Saturday that the six-nation talks would start in late August but that a specific date had not been set.

Diplomat says Moscow could send peacekeepers to Iraq

Posted on Monday 2 November 2009 at 09:21 AM - 1 Comments - Post Comment - Link

MOSCOW - Russia's Foreign Ministry reiterated Friday that Moscow would consider sending peacekeeping troops to Iraq if a new security arrangement is established there under the aegis of the United Nations.

Russia will not contribute troops to the U.S.-led forces currently in Iraq, but might send peacekeepers "if there is a corresponding decision by the U.N. Security Council," the Interfax news agency quoted ministry spokesman Alexander Yakovenko as saying.

At the same time, Yakovenko said the issue "requires thorough examination" and added, "In my opinion, the time is not yet ripe," according to Interfax.

On Thursday, Russia's diplomatic point man on Iraq, Deputy Foreign Minister Yuri Fedotov, said Moscow was prepared to consider a U.S. proposal for a U.N. Security Council resolution aimed at bringing more international troops to pearl strand wholesale Iraq and would weigh sending its own peacekeepers there under a U.N. mandate.

U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan and U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said Wednesday that there has been discussion about the possibility of a new U.N. resolution whose aim Annan said would be to broaden the U.N. mandate in Iraq and internationalize the U.S. and British operation.

Russia, a permanent veto-wielding member of the Security Council, strongly opposed the U.S.-led war and has called for a stronger U.N. role in postwar Iraq while also trying to patch up damaged relations with the United States.

Diplomat calls for stronger UN role in Iraq

Posted on Monday 2 November 2009 at 09:20 AM - 1 Comments - Post Comment - Link

MOSCOW - Russia supports a stronger United Nations role in Iraq to help the country quickly restore its sovereignty, a senior diplomat said Wednesday.

Deputy Foreign Minister Yuri Fedotov said the U.N. Security Council may need to pass a new resolution outlining a road map for rebuilding Iraq's sovereignty.

"Eventually, it would be necessary to approve a new resolution on the issue that would set a time frame," Fedotov said at a briefing. "The sooner we achieve progress in restoring Iraq's sovereignty, the better for the Iraqi people and the region."

Speaking after Iraq's U.S.-approved Governing Council made its U.N. debut Tuesday, Fedotov welcomed its formation but spoke of the need to silver pearl necklace move quickly toward the creation of a true Iraqi government.

"We consider the establishment of the Governing Council to be a step in the right direction, but ... also believe that additional efforts must be taken now so that the restoration of Iraq's sovereignty and the establishment of Iraqi state agencies ... is conducted with the active participation of representatives of all layers of Iraqi population," Fedotov said.

Fedotov said that Russia was ready to consider sending a U.N. peacekeeping force to Iraq if the issue comes to discussion at the Security Council.

He would not comment on how the death of Saddam Hussein's two eldest sons Odai and Qusai, who were killed by U.S. forces Tuesday, could influence the situation in Iraq.

"It's difficult for me to say how this fact will affect the situation in Iraq, bearing in mind that the regime change had already occurred," Fedotov said.

Did Russophobes help cause Sept. 11?

Posted on Monday 2 November 2009 at 09:18 AM - 1 Comments - Post Comment - Link

The other day, as I was cleaning out my computer's hard drive, I came across yet another signature on the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

No, I don't mean another terrorist. I mean a writer. One who was advocating policies that played a direct role in paving the way to Sept. 11 – by opposing any serious cooperation with Russia against the Taliban or terrorism.

Who was it that obstructed any effective Russian-American action against the Taliban in 1999-2001? Who was it that protected the Taliban against any unilateral Russian action, so their regime could hold on – and go on to its glorious day of the attacks on New York and Washington? It was a band of anti-Russia writers in the United States – not just a few people, but a veritable industry in punditry. It was an industry that formed the conventional wisdom in the "analysis" business up to pearl wholesale Sept. 11.

Here is the example I came across. It's from the Orlando (Florida) Sentinel from May 7, 2001. The headline is clear and to the point: "West Shouldn't Back Russia's Crackdown on Islamic Terror."

The article, an opinion piece, lives up all too well to the headline. The author, analyst Fiona Hill of the Brookings Institution, a Washington-based think tank, paints an ominous picture – not of terrorism, but of the Russian mistake of fighting back against terrorism.

She warns that "Russian President Vladimir Putin wants to enlist Europe and the United States in an international crusade against militant insurgencies and Islamic terrorism that will soon gather momentum as the civil war in Afghanistan intensifies with the advent of spring. Europe and America should be cautious about joining forces with Russia."

Russia is not only recklessly militarist in this picture, it is also incompetent: "This endeavor seems destined for failure. Instead of curbing terrorist activity, the most likely outcomes are that Russia will be diverted from critical reforms and an already-unstable situation in Eurasia will be exacerbated." Read those words closely. You'll see in them an entire culture of second-guessing Russia. An entire tradition of saying Russia can't do anything right.

And that's just the beginning. The piece goes on and on in the same vein.

It blames Islamism on the bad experience of Russian influence in the region, not on more-logical culprits such as the withdrawal of Russian influence from the region and the influx of Islamist influences. This was the same line of argument that led the United States in the mid-1990s to promote ever-greater "independence" (from Russia, not from Islamism) in the region, by such means as implicitly backing the Taliban. This was done in hope of establishing an area of total independence from Russian influence.

It condemns possible support for Russia in Afghanistan by using the device of guilt by association – association with Russian policy in Chechnya. Because Putin advocates such an association between anti-terrorist struggles, Hill takes the opportunity to oppose any serious anti-terrorist cooperation on the same grounds.

It is stated with horror that "in Central Asia, Putin has already succeeded in making common cause with the United States against the Taliban. Russia and America entered into an unprecedented alliance in supporting United Nations sanctions against Afghanistan in December 2000. The Russian and American militaries are holding consultations on Central Asia, and Russia is creating a rapid deployment force to counter Islamic militant activity in the region."

Alas, this common effort on the ground consisted in reality of far less than met Hill's eye. President Bill Clinton's administration refused in 2000 to freshwater pearl pendant go beyond economic sanctions against Afghanistan – the kind of passive sanctions that often really are counterproductive. It refused to join forces with Russia behind the Northern Alliance.

An entire series of articles like Hill's was written to scare the Clinton and early Bush administrations off from any more serious joint action. Another series of articles, much along the lines of Hill's, spoke in horror against any independent Russian action against the Taliban. What a mess it would make, we were told, if Russia took any anti-Taliban action.

Maybe it would have been better to have supported the "mess" of a Russian attack on the Taliban. We might have spared ourselves the much bigger mess of Sept. 11.

I have not seen one word of rethinking from these would-be analysts. Not one word of regret for having given their prejudices a free run at the expense of vital U.S. interests. Not one word of apology for having helped bring down upon America the nightmare of Sept. 11. Instead, I see many of them going on shamelessly churning out their anti-Russian "analyses."

Indeed, after Sept. 11 they went straight on with arguments against helping the Northern Alliance. They supported the strategy of total reliance on the Pashtuns – which brought the United States to the edge of losing the war. Then, when the United States turned around and started coordinating its bombing with the ground forces of the Northern Alliance, they said they were furious about the advances of the Northern Alliance.

In the first few weeks after Sept. 11, they kept on issuing their old warnings against the United States joining with Russia in a broader struggle against Islamism, or, as they were wont to put it, against "joining Russia in a war against all Islam." At the very same time, hack anti-American analysts in Moscow were writing in the press that Russia shouldn't make the mistake of "joining America in a war against all Islam."

It might seem hard on poor Fiona Hill to be saying all this about her article, which I just happened to alight upon, when there are so many bigger fish who did the same thing in a far worse form! One might think of a Starr, a Brzezinski, a Goble. Hers is the least of the names that have to be added onto the list of the authors of the Sept. 11 massacre.

And yet, that's just the point. Lots of people were saying this. And if you look at what was written by one of the ordinary, "moderate" ones like Hill, the meaning is absolutely clear:

Ignore all Russian warnings about terrorism; refuse any serious active measures that could be taken together with Russia, and oppose any unilateral Russian measures as well; denounce Russian behavior and motivations; teach people to pearl strand wholesale shut their ears to Russia; silence any Russian appeals for cooperation by surrounding them with an entire litany of arguments and accusations; make it counterproductive for Russians even to try to give Americans any warnings about this danger.

And the consequences of that are, alas, equally clear. It was a genuine form of co-authorship of Sept. 11.

Ira Straus is Fulbright professor at the Moscow State Institute of International Relations (MGIMO) and is U.S. coordinator of the independent Com-mittee on Eastern Europe and Russia in NATO.

Dictatorship of opinion polls over needs of reform

Posted on Monday 2 November 2009 at 09:14 AM - 2 Comments - Post Comment - Link

Do public opinion polls determine Kremlin policy? If they do, this signals just how much Russia has changed over the past decade, especially during the Putin presidency. Emulating the West in all possible ways does not always work to Russia's advantage, however. Russia under President Vladimir Putin can't afford the niceties and luxuries of choosing Western manipulation of politics over real and meaningful changes. Spin doctors guide America's President George W. Bush because they have too; Putin's fascination with popularity is not what Russia needs at the moment.

When elections appear on the horizon, most incumbents naturally desire no major policy changes that may upset the electorate. Thus, one can argue that Putin's recent "go slow" approach to the implementation of his reform agenda makes sense. On the other hand, an even stronger argument can be made that soft-peddling this agenda is exactly what Putin should not do. His presidency is about reform, first and foremost. Falling back on "PR politics" is what Putin was supposed not to nugget pearl be about, and it is the last thing Russia needs today.

Unfortunately, it seems the addiction to the status quo that is at the very core of Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov's political agenda is contagious. Kasyanov's fingerprints can be found on all the major reforms that have been initiated – and that appear likely to remain the stuff of high-falutin' shop talk for the Duma and the Presiden-tial Administration.

The "hurry up and wait" restructuring of UES is the most glaring lapse of the present government, which claims to be reformist. Yet another debate on the package of bills relating to UES has been postponed for two weeks. It is an open secret that the Duma will most likely not debate on the second reading of the company's reform package on Dec. 18. Just like with the debate on the 2003 budget, Russia's fumbling parliamentarians are waiting for marching orders from the Kremlin. Everyone involved in restructuring has come to the conclusion that UES chief Anatoly Chubais' idea is a "lose-lose" proposition, both politically and economically. There will be plenty of political finger pointing after this amazingly thoughtless restructuring plan is signed into law.

The debate surrounding the bill on federal housing policy is another area where politics overtakes common sense. Instead of approaching this critical issue head on, the Duma prefers declarations to substance. The first debate on restructuring the housing sector did not meaningfully alter the status quo. The status quo itself is unclear, which is why the debate was necessary in the first place. Check the Duma's schedule: Where is mention made of a second debate on this issue? It has been put on the back burner, which is becoming a crowded place.

The lapse into political complacency surrounding legal reform is another worrisome area. The heroic Dmitry Kozak Commission – the endeavor to reform relations between federal, regional and local governments – seems to be among those rescued from the Moscow theater crisis in October: It has been put to sleep and remains in intensive care.

What started as a sharp attack from the center to finally put the country's laws into some kind of manageable order has been reduced to freshwater pearl jewelry mere chattering with regional leaders determined to preserve their privileges at the expense of legal normality. The Kremlin does not seem too concerned at this point. The cost of reform, it would seem, is becoming increasingly higher with every passing day. In the meantime, the meaning of Russia's integral legal integrity becomes less certain.

If Russia truly desires to be a global partner in the war against international terrorism, fighting under the Red Star will not be enough. Delaying military reform endangers the sovereignty of the country. The failed war in Chechnya and the inability to protect the citizens of the capital should be enough evidence that the military bequeathed from the Soviet period is rotten to the core. Postponing military reform not only threatens Russia; it scares the rest of the world. Without reform of the military, the very real concern of "loose nukes" makes Russia an international liability and peril to international peace.

Russia under Putin has finally understood the importance and the usefulness of public relations. Putin has the ability to present Russia in a way no other leader of this country has been able to do. He is articulate and savvy. However, his reform message is getting muddled by the government's predilection for putting form before content, which is wrong and dangerous.

Leadership is about making tough decisions for the public good. Putin does not really have the luxury to be a leader in the Western sense just yet. His mandate is to return Russia to some semblance of normality and make the country a respected member of the international community. The evident "go easy" and "go slow" on what his presidency seems to wholesale pearl jewelry be about to undermine his mission to ultimately make Russia a "normal country." This has been attempted many times in Russia's recent past – and it has always failed.

Peter Lavelle is a Moscow-based analyst and author of "Peter Lavelle's Weekly Russia Report," available at www.russiareport.ru.