RA’s Daily Russian News Blast – April 3, 2009
TODAY: Reserve currency idea receives lukewarm reception at G20; cooperation with US on Afghanistan supply routes a possibility; Russia determining factor for NATO; troops remain in Georgia; Nashi activist held.
President Medvedev concurred with the other G20 leaders in approving a $1.1 trillion deal to fight the recession. His reiteration of the proposal to create a new reserve currency was not met with enthusiasm, however, says the Moscow Times. According to ITAR-TASS, Medvedev is ‘satisfied’ with Obama’s approach to the thorny issue of US missile defense. Russia is willing to consider cooperating with the US on securing supply routes for troops fighting in Afghanistan, says Reuters. Fyodor Lukyanov comments upon the ineluctable complexities of the ‘reset‘ as an ‘objective imbalance exists’, between Washington and Moscow. NATO’s future relationship with Russia is a ‘critical element of 21st century security‘, writes the Secretary General of NATO, Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, in the New York Times. It has been reported that Russia has impelled North Korea to ‘show restraint‘ with regards to the state’s forthcoming rocket launch to ‘help allay the international community’s concerns‘, says Foreign Ministry spokesman, Andrei Nesterenko.