Brussels Shows Muscle on Protecting Energy Competition

By Robert Amsterdam | Published: September 20, 2007

Call me a Euroskeptic, but in recent years I have become accustomed to watching many, if not most, controversial policy initiatives go before Brussels only to die, caught up in a web of extravagant bureaucracy that would make even Kafka shudder. Easily the most polemical proposal in recent times concerns the common policy on energy […]

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The Dusty and Abandoned Conflict

By James Kimer | Published: September 19, 2007

A Fist Full of Euros has posted the first in a series on the Frozen Conflicts in the breakaway Moldovan Republic of Transnistria. See also past blog posts by Edward Lucas and Lyndon at Scraps of Moscow. AFOE: As for the conflict itself… well, it’s not so much frozen as dusty and abandoned. The original […]

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The Moral Discount of Energy and Democracy

By Robert Amsterdam | Published:

Today in the Wall Street Journal there is an interesting op/ed which focuses on the urgent questions of sovereignty and foreign policy in the context of energy relations. Both India and China, widely acknowledged to be the world’s two strongest growth economies over the next decade, have found themselves competing aggressively all over the world […]

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Boris Akunin: “Russian society is still moving in the right direction”

By James Kimer | Published:

The Guardian is running an interview with Boris Akunin, AKA Grigory Chkhartishvili, who has become widely known as the JK Rowling of current Russian writers. His historical detective novels, based in the Tsarist era, have reached unprecedented heights of popularity among Russia’s emerging middle class, and have also been made into several films. In the […]

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RA’s Daily Russia News Blast – Sept. 19, 2007

By Citizen M | Published:

Representatives of the pro-Kremlin United Russia party and the opposition Communist Party debate in the Interfax news agency office in Moscow on Wednesday, Sept. 19, 2007. (Photo: AP) This week the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs, or RSPP, which represents the country’s biggest business groups, will meet with Putin during a three-day investment forum […]

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A History of State Theft

By Robert Amsterdam | Published:

Today I saw this interesting article in Kommersant, which gives an overview of the Russian government’s unlawful takeover of the oil sector. The reporters don’t provide any new information, but for readers who are not familiar with this process, it is a good primer. One thing I would dispute in this article however is the […]

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Grigory Pasko: A Doormat for his Masters’ Feet

By Grigory Pasko | Published: September 18, 2007

A Doormat for his Masters’ Feet… By Grigory Pasko, journalist Senior Investigator for Particularly Important Cases of the Procuracy-General of the Russian Federation Salavat Karimov, who had headed the investigation in two criminal cases against Mikhail Khodorkovsky, has announced that he is retiring. The simple explanation is that he was asked to turn in the […]

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RA’s Daily Russia News Blast – Sept. 18, 2007

By Citizen M | Published:

Vladimir Zhirinovsky has some choice words for Britain at a news conference for Andrei Lugovoi’s Duma campaign in Moscow on Tuesday, Sept. 18, 2007. (Photo: AP) Media are beginning to debate the legacy of Vladimir Putin’s eight years in power, with a strong focus on the dramatic changes in the economy and Russia’s new foreign […]

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Applebaum: It’s the Selection Process, Comrade

By Robert Amsterdam | Published:

Columnist Anne Applebaum has a new piece out on the appointment of Viktor Zubkov: All of which goes a long way to confirm something I’ve maintained for some time: The identity of the next president of Russia doesn’t actually matter. Though a lot of analytical effort has already been wasted on careful pre-electoral scrutiny of […]

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Khodorkovsky Case Update at the JURIST

By Robert Amsterdam | Published:

Please visit the JURIST website to read an update I wrote on the Mikhail Khodorkovsky case, discussing recent decisions in Switzerland and Russia.

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