Month: February 2010

February 15, 2010

RA’s Daily Russian News Blast – Feb 15, 2010

TODAY: Protesters gather in Baikalsk over fate of paper and pulp mill; Medvedev’s Khanty-Mansisk governor unanimously approved; official released from pretrial detention thanks to Duma guarantor; Russia should attract skilled foreigners; no ...
February 13, 2010

Mr. Rogozin’s Neighborhood

Russia’s ambassador to NATO, Dmitri Rogozin, has gotten himself a lot of press for his Twitter habits – were he a professional athlete in the NBA or NFL, he would probably be one of those guys who gets fined for it all the time.  ...
February 12, 2010

Nord Stream Verdict: ‘Safe’

The Baltic Sea, the site of Gazprom’s $10 billion Nord Stream pipeline project, is one of the world’s most highly polluted waters.  Nonetheless, Finnish environmental authorities have given their approval for the project R...
February 12, 2010

Energy Blast – Feb 12, 2010

Following Vladimir Putin’s dismissal of environmental concerns regarding the project, Finland’s environmental officials have given their approval for the Nord Stream pipeline – the final permit needed for the project, at which co...
February 12, 2010

Today in Russian Business – Feb 12, 2010

Dmitry Medvedev’s commission to modernize the economy is calling on big business to contribute to ‘an innovative economy‘ with initiatives such as Mikhail Prokhorov’s low-budget car.  The president is also pushing for ...
February 12, 2010

RA’s Daily Russian News Blast – Feb 12, 2010

TODAY: Russia and Cuba praise association; Kaliningrad governor postpones meeting; gay and lesbian organizations file lawsuit in Europe; US-Russia relations are not easy; Kirov governor says modernization is beyond economy; Putin wishes luck for V...
February 12, 2010

Grigory Pasko: The Conservationist Struggle for Lake Baikal

The wonderful poet and writer Sasha Raduzhkevich, who left life early, once called everything taking place in Russia «the struggle of a struggle with a struggle». Indeed, in our country everything is a struggle: from evicting militants from the hi...
February 11, 2010

NATO Doesn’t Blink

Well, NATO might not object to Russia buying warships from France, but pretty much everybody else does.  While a spokesman for Anders Fogh Rasmussen used the issue to assure everybody that NATO and Russia are harmless pals (one wonders),...
February 11, 2010

Ukrainology

Here goes a bit from my latest in the Huffington Post on the outcome of the presidential elections in Ukraine and the return of Viktor Yanukovych.  Though it was published after I had already posted my article, I liked this line from the Econ...
February 11, 2010

In With the Old

The New York Times comments today on the Russian government’s lip-service to notions of innovation, modernization, its references to stamping out corruption and improving investor confidence, saying that Dmitry Medvedev is effectively just a...