Month: May 2008

May 19, 2008

Energy Blast – May 19, 2008

Russia has reportedly sent a fleet of nuclear-powered ice breakers into the Arctic, and many fear that Moscow will attempt to illegally annex some of the potentially gas and oil rich region. Igor Sechin says Rosneft’s stellar growth proves t...
May 19, 2008

Today in Russian Business – May 19, 2008

Steel producer Severstal is set to issue $1.5 billion in Eurobonds, which it could invest in a purchase of US steelmaker Esmark. It is also reportedly buying WCI Steel, another American asset, for $140 million. “Siberia, where Russians waited in l...
May 19, 2008

RA’s Daily Russia News Blast – May 19, 2008

TODAY: Kasparov’s National Assembly meets for the first time; Khodorkovsky accuses Sechin of plotting his arrest; Putin accused of decorating private residence with state treasures; special report on Russia Today’s english news channel. Georgia re...
May 18, 2008

Trying Out a Little Openness

The Week in Review of the New York Times has a very interesting article today about the transformative power of just a little bit of openness in autocratic societies: Still, it is worth recalling a time when a little openness flew out of control. ...
May 18, 2008

Khodorkovsky Interview in the Times

A very rare interview with Mikhail Khodorkovsky is published in the Times today: Jailed tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky ‘framed’ by key Putin aide Mark Franchetti, Moscow THE former Russian oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky, now serving an eight year pris...
May 16, 2008

Grigory Pasko: Looking a gift horse in the mouth, Part 3

[See Part 1 and Part 2 of this series] Nord Stream, Scandinavian Style Beware of Greeks bearing gifts Part 3 Grigory Pasko, journalist I met with environmental activist and member of the «greens» Party of the island of Gotland Stefaan De Maecker a...
May 16, 2008

To take away and to divide up

Here’s another exclusive translation from RBK Daily, this one from Thursday, 15 May 2008. Our Russia correspondent Grigory Pasko has reported in the past on the arbitrary land seizures that await residents of Sochi in connection with the Olympics....
May 16, 2008

The Impotence of Omnipotence

Ivan Krastev of the Centre for Liberal Strategies in Sofia, Bulgaria, has a strongly worded opinion article published in today’s Wall Street Journal remarking on the dual nature of the new Russian government, and the potential for internal c...
May 16, 2008

The Business of Spying, the Spying of Business

Remember Mikhail Fradkov? The quietly loyal and possibly inept former prime minister who was shuffled aside in a startling move last year by Putin to appoint Victor Zubkov – throwing everybody “off the trail” to protect his prefe...