Month: May 2009

May 25, 2009

The Soon-to-Fail Eastern Partnership

A new 5-page policy brief by the Spanish think tank FRIDE takes a look at the EU’s Eastern Partnership proposal, and finds it riddled with holes and destined for failure.  One, among the many, flaws is that too many EU member states are...
May 25, 2009

Smells Like Yukos

This is a rather strange story from Moscow News, but it seems that one Russian businessman wants to express his solidarity with Mikhail Khodorkovsky by producing a perfume line bearing the Yukos company name.  It will be tough to sell more of...
May 25, 2009

Khodorkovsky Accuses Procuracy of Wiretapping

This just came over the wire from RIA Novosti, and was also reported earlier on Robert Amsterdam’s Twitter feed: Jailed Yukos founder Mikhail Khodorkovsky accused Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) on Monday of listening in on his...
May 25, 2009

Energy Blast – May 25, 2009

At the EU summit Russia warned that it will not extend any loans to Ukraine and refused to offer guarantees that gas supplies would not be interrupted.  President Viktor Yushchenko has said that the agreement Ukraine and Russia came to in Jan...
May 25, 2009

Today in Russian Business – May 25, 2009

According to First Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov, the bad loan situation is apparently ‘under control’ and the country ‘prepared for a difficult situation’.  Other sources are less confident, predicting that non-...
May 25, 2009

RA’s Daily Russian News Blast – May 25, 2009

TODAY: No resolution at EU-Russia summit; Putin warns against outside interference in dealings with Ukraine; Lavrov encourages dialogue with Hamas; Kremlin concerned by OSCE appointment; the activities of Patriarch Kirill Reuters reports that Russ...
May 24, 2009

The Limits of Engagement

The Washington Post is running an editorial today criticizing the engagement policy of the Obama administration toward Hugo Chavez’s Venezuela – where conditions for the opposition have deteriorated rapidly over the past 2-3 months.&nb...
May 22, 2009

Respecting Russia vs. Loving Russia

One of the oldest tricks in the authoritarian playbook is the subtle theft of the people’s sovereignty, grafting the rights of citizens onto a regime of personal power. Cuba’s Fidel Castro was and is the grandmaster of this tactic R...
May 22, 2009

Enlisting Next Generation Siloviki

KGB methods are back in action Grigory Pasko, journalist Echo Moskvy and Kasparov.Ru are both reporting a story about an attempt by an FSB officer to “recruit” a student and opposition activist at Moscow State University, threatening t...
May 22, 2009

Light at the End of the Tunnel

Sometimes you can tell the health of the Russian economy not by the RTS swings or major acquisition moves, but rather something as simple as movements in the executive hiring sector.  The Russia branch of Goldman Sachs has lost two key guys i...