August 12, 1999    
This Date's Issues: 3435 • 3436 •

Johnson's Russia List
#3436
12 August 1999
davidjohnson@erols.com

[Note from David Johnson:
1. AFP: Report: Primakov Agrees To Head New Political Alliance.
2. Reuters: Russia's Putin keeps veil of secrecy about himself.
3. Reuters: Russia's Putin rules out changes as parties jostle.
4. Boston Globe: David Filipov, Russian nemesis rises again. 
Chechen rebel hero is a leader in Dagestan uprising.
5. AP: Russia Focuses on Islamic Uprising.
6. AFP: Russia's regional ambitions threatened by Dagestan conflict.
7. Itar-Tass: Russia Jews to Monitor Anti-Semitism.
8. Wendell w. Solomons: Advent of St. Putin the Dragon Slayer.
9. Komsomolskaya Pravda: Vasiliy Ustyuzhanin, War in the Caucasus--
the Kremlin's Backup Option?
10. Itar-Tass: Ryzhkov Says Russia's Power Needs Reform.
11. NTV: Russian Pundit: Putin Unlikely To Win 2000 Election 
(Igor Bunin).
12. Moscow Times: Brian Whitmore, The Men Who Would Be King - Won't.
13. Investor's Business Daily: Jim Christie and Ed Carson,
Russia's Upheaval In The Kremlin Reflects A Very Battered Economy.
As country tries to rebound, Yeltsin's new prime minister faces huge 
debts and unrest.]

******

#1
Report: Primakov Agrees To Head New Political Alliance

MOSCOW, Aug 12, 1999 -- (Agence France Presse) Former Russian premier Yevgeny 
Primakov has agreed to lead a new political party formed by powerful Moscow 
mayor Yury Luzhkov and senior regional governors, Interfax reported on 
Thursday.

The news agency cited Saint Petersburg governor Vladimir Yakovlev, who is a 
member of the new election bloc, as saying that Primakov would make the 
formal announcement on Thursday.

Primakov has been courted by Luzhkov and his allies to head the new bloc, 
called All Russia-Fatherland.

The centrist group whose formation has been opposed by the Kremlin hopes to 
win a majority in Decembers parliamentary polls.

Primakov remains one of the most popular politicians in Russia despite being 
sacked from the government in May.

His addition to the Luzhkov-government alliance is likely to make the bloc 
one of the strongest parties in Russia, and would see the fortunes of the 
Communist Party suffer dramatically.

It would also position both Primakov and Luzhkov to run for president in the 
June 2000 national polls. 

********

#2
Russia's Putin keeps veil of secrecy about himself
By Adam Tanner

MOSCOW, Aug 12 (Reuters) - Days after Russian President Boris Yeltsin named 
Vladimir Putin his new prime minister and heir apparent, the long-time KGB 
agent continues to maintain a veil of secrecy about his background. 

With experience in the cloak-and-dagger ways of KGB operations and then the 
backroom intrigues of Kremlin politics, Putin has remained the least-known 
leader in the Russia's young history as democracy. 

``Vladimir is by nature a very reserved person, a person who knows how to 
control himself,'' said Stanislav Yeremeyev, who worked with Putin after he 
left the KGB to work as a university adviser in St Petersburg in 1990. 

Valery Malyshev, a vice governor of St Petersburg who worked with Putin in 
the early 1990s said: ``He is a very serious person...He can be very tough 
when he needs to be be.'' 

Yeltsin appointed Putin, then head of the Federal Security Service heir to 
the KGB, on Monday, and in a televised address endorsed him to become 
Russia's next president. 

Since then Putin has demonstrated a reserved, even chilling, stance in his 
public appearances without smiles -- even after telling Russians he was 
seeking their votes in the 2000 presidential election. 

He has displayed no public sign of grief after the death of his father last 
week, but has found time among the press of his new responsibilities to 
travel twice to his hometown St Petersburg for the funeral and subsequent 
memorial service. 

When Yeltsin asked him what his mood was on Tuesday, Putin, who served as a 
KGB spy from 1975 to 1990 in Russia and in East Germany, replied tersely: 
``Combative.'' 

Details about his family and background remain hazy. 

``I know absolutely nothing,'' Yeltsin spokesman Dmitry Yakushkin told 
Reuters. ``I realise that Putin could become the president but I can't just 
answer off the cuff.'' 

The government press office issued a biography of Putin with just four lines 
of chronological information. His entire KGB career was missing. 

``Yes, it is a little bit strange,'' said one spokeswoman. 

In his only extended television interview this week, Putin showed military 
terseness when asked about his family. 

``I have a wife and two children, two girls, aged 13 and 14. They study in 
Moscow,'' he told NTV on Monday. Hobbies? ``Sport, literature, music. Which 
sport? Fighting and judo.'' 

Malyshev said Putin wife worked in the government, but abruptly ended the 
conversation when asked for details. 

In a country where many respect the tough rulers of the Soviet and tsarist 
past, some Kremlin analysts say Putin may deliberately keep his distance from 
the public to preserve an aura of mystery and respect for his leadership 
efforts. 

Several former colleagues say that although Putin is a very private person, 
he is not, however, the rigid robotron that he appears to be on television. 

``He is a completely normal person,'' said one associate who asked that he 
not be named. ``He knows how to smile and laugh.'' 

A series of other colleagues contacted in recent days declined to talked 
about Putin at all. 

All those who did speak, as well as past documents, show a recurrent theme in 
Putin's career of tough seriousness. 

``He is modest, responsive, principled, exclusively honest,'' according to 
his 1975 student evaluation at the law faculty of then Leningrad State 
University. ``He knows how to insist on his opinions and convictions, and 
enjoys exclusively authority and respect in the collective.'' 

******

#3
Russia's Putin rules out changes as parties jostle
By Patrick Lannin

MOSCOW, Aug 12 (Reuters) - Russia's Acting Prime Minister Vladimir Putin 
reassured colleagues on Thursday he planned no big shake-up of the government 
as rumours swirled about which leading politicians would link up ahead of 
December elections. 

Putin, whose nomination on Monday by President Boris Yeltsin stunned Russia, 
was also set to continue his talks with political leaders to secure approval 
for his candidacy at a vote in the State Duma lower house of parliament on 
Monday. 

Yeltsin held talks in the Kremlin with Emergencies Minister Sergei Shoigu and 
the head of the security service Nikolai Patrushev before leaving in the 
early afternoon for his Gorki-9 residence near Moscow. 

A meeting expected with Putin seemed unlikely to take place. 

``The end of the world which was promised for yesterday (during a solar 
eclipse) did not take place and we can continue to work,'' Putin was quoted 
by Interfax news agency as telling top cabinet members during a meeting. 

``One should not await changes or new nominations,'' he said. 

Putin has already said he would avoid any major shake-up but Russian media 
have speculated he might ditch some ministers. 

Putin replaces Sergei Stepashin, like himself a former security chief who 
occupied the premier's chair for barely three months. Yeltsin gave no reason 
for the move and many commentators said Stepashin had been doing a good job. 

Yeltsin compounded the shock by saying he thought Putin, the laconic former 
head of the Federal Security Service (FSB) with a low political profile, 
would be the best person to succeed him after next summer's presidential 
election. 

Putin must still be approved as premier by the Duma and a vote is planned for 
Monday. 

He has already won the backing of leading centrist politician and former 
Prime Minister Viktor Chernmoyrdin. 

Putin was set later on Thursday to meet Vladimir Zhirinovsky, flamboyant head 
of the Liberal Democratic Party. 

Zhirinovsky has said he would back Putin if the premier supported the burial 
of Soviet state founder Vladimir Lenin and the banning of the Communist 
Party. 

Meanwhile, speculation raged over how leading politicians would line up in 
the Duma election, set for December 19. 

Most attention has focused on which party former Prime Minister Yevgeny 
Primakov will join. Many expect him to throw in his lot with the centrist 
Fatherland grouping of powerful Moscow mayor and likely presidential 
candidate Yuri Luzhkov. 

Primakov is one of the most popular politicians in Russia and his backing 
would likely give a big boost to any party. 

Vladimir Yakovlev, governor of St Petersburg and a leading figure in the 
grouping of regional leaders called All Russia, allied to Fatherland Union, 
told Interfax news agency Primakov had assured him he would accept an offer 
to lead the Fatherland-All Russia coalition. 

Stepashin was also reported by Russian news agencies to be holding meetings 
with leaders of most of the leading parties, who are anxious to court the 
former premier. 

Another former Prime Minister, Sergei Kiriyenko, said Stepashin should lead 
right-leaning parties, which have formed a coalition, into the elections. 

******

#4
Boston Globe
12 August 1999
[for personal use only]
Russian nemesis rises again 
Chechen rebel hero is a leader in Dagestan uprising
By David Filipov

MOSCOW - For some in his Caucasus homeland, Shamil Basayev is a Chechen Che 
Guevara, liberator of the Muslim peoples of southern Russia from the Kremlin 
that has dominated them since czarist times.

For many Russians, however, Basayev is their own private Osama bin Laden - 
terrorist, drug runner, counterfeiter, kidnapper, and public enemy number one.

Yesterday he emerged as the leader of Moscow's most troublesome insurgency 
since he helped lead Chechnya's drive to de facto independence. He wasted no 
time in delivering an ultimatum to his Russian foes.

''There is no force on earth capable of stopping the Muslim fighters other 
than the Almighty, who guides them on the road of sacred war,'' Basayev, 34, 
told reporters who had been brought to him from Grozny, the Chechen capital.

A former computer salesman whose daring, commando-style raids helped drive 
the Russian army from Chechnya in 1996, Basayev was named chief military 
commander by Islamic separatists fighting government troops in the southern 
Russian region of Dagestan.

While Russian leaders remained confident that their troops would soon defeat 
the insurgents, Basayev's emergence as the leader of the uprising lent new 
credibility to the militants' effort to create an Islamic republic in 
Dagestan.

''The mujahideen will force Russia to leave Dagestan if they don't do it on 
their own,'' the bearded Basayev, in battle fatigues, told the reporters at 
an improvised news conference in one of the villages captured by his men.

Back in Moscow, acting Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, a former intelligence 
chief appointed head of Russia's government by President Boris N. Yeltsin 
Monday, repeated his prediction of a quick victory over the militants.

''They are running like rabbits from one village to another, so it's hard to 
say their number,'' said Putin, who met with parliamentary leaders yesterday 
to stump for support for his new government. ''They are acting like cowards, 
and rarely enter into battle with our troops.''

Russian officials said they have inflicted heavy losses on the rebels while 
10 servicemen have been killed and 27 wounded since the insurgents crossed 
into Dagestan from Chechnya on Saturday.

Russian Interior Minister Vladimir Rushailo told reporters that government 
troops had the militants surrounded and would ''destroy'' them in little 
time. Basayev, shown on Russian television driving around in a blue pickup 
truck, countered that his men had two Russian battalions surrounded in the 
mountainous region on the border of Chechnya.

''They will either have to surrender or be destroyed,'' Basayev said.

Who's surrounding whom? The contradictory statements recall the final days of 
the Chechen war, when Basayev led 1,500 guerrillas into Grozny, surrounding a 
much larger and better-equipped government force and killing nearly 1,000 
Russian soldiers. 

Even while losing the Chechen capital, Russian commanders insisted it was 
they who had Basayev surrounded. But in the end, the guerrilla prevailed. 
Throughout the 1994-1996 Chechen war, Basayev fashioned a legend out of his 
ability to win despite uneven odds, which he underscored with his trademark 
combination of bravado, dry wit, and military acumen.

In June 1995, he led a bloody raid in which his men took 1,200 hostages and 
holed up in a maternity ward in the Russian town of Budyonnovsk. More than 
100 people were killed, but Basayev got away after receiving a promise from 
Russian authorities of a cease-fire in Chechnya. Later, he said his commandos 
had made it to Budyonnovsk by bribing Russian police officers and that his 
plan had been to attack Moscow.

For the Chechens, the raid on Budyonnovsk was a turning point in the war and 
made Basayev a hero. For them, his tactics recalled Imam Shamil, the 
legendary Caucasian warrior who fought the czarist armies for a quarter of a 
century before surrendering in 1859. Out-gunned and outnumbered, Shamil would 
launch lightning raids from his mountain hideouts on enemy outposts, causing 
death and destruction and taking hostages.

For Russians, Budyonnovsk launched Basayev's reputation as Russia's worst 
terrorist. Since the war, Russian authorities have accused him of running 
factories that produce heroin and hashish and have said that he and his 
fighters are behind kidnapping raids in southern Russia.

With his intrusion into Dagestan, Basayev, one of whose ancestors fought 
alongside Shamil, is trying to borrow another of his namesake's most 
successful tactics: seeking to use Islam to unite combative Caucasus tribes 
against Russia. For the past year he has been advocating uniting landlocked 
Chechnya with Dagestan, which borders on the Caspian Sea, into an Islamic 
republic governed under the sharia, or legal code.

But for all his authority in Chechnya, next to his accomplishments as a 
fighter Basayev's efforts as a politician have paled. He placed second to his 
former commander and fellow war hero, Aslan Maskhadov, in Chechnya's 1997 
presidential elections, and failed to deliver his promise of cracking down on 
lawlessness and violence in a six-month tenure as the republic's prime 
minister that ended last summer.

Since then, Basayev has concentrated on building and training what he calls 
his ''Islamic Peacekeeping Army,'' the multinational force he has apparently 
led into Dagestan.

Basayev's failure as a politician may be as significant for the prospects of 
his Dagestan expedition as is his military prowess. The job of winning the 
hearts and minds of people in multiethnic Dagestan will not be as easy as it 
was with his own Chechen people.

But the lessons of the Chechen war indicate that his ability to frustrate 
Russian troops should not be underestimated, even if that is what Russia's 
current leaders are doing.

Yesterday, Basayev and his sidekick Khattab, a Jordanian of Chechen origin 
who once served in the guard of King Hussein, made a new, daring promise: 
that they would soon occupy Bunaisk, a city 40 miles west of Dagestan's 
capital.

''We will fight,'' Basayev vowed, ''until the full victory of Islam in the 
world.''

******

#5
Russia Focuses on Islamic Uprising
August 12, 1999
By VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV

MOSCOW (AP) - President Boris Yeltsin gathered top officials in the Kremlin 
today to discuss stamping out an Islamic rebellion in southern Russia, while 
the media speculated the conflict might be used to impose emergency measures.

``Along with Chechnya, this is the most difficult region,'' Yeltsin said of 
the fighting in the republic of Dagestan. Islamic rebels have taken several 
villages and have been battling security forces for six days.

``We shall be able to overcome this problem gradually, without haste, just as 
it was planned,'' Yeltsin said before his meeting with Sergei Shoigu, 
minister for emergency situations.

Shoigu said his ministry was preparing to start relief operations in Dagestan 
once the fighting stops, but the conflict showed few signs of abating despite 
government promises of a quick victory.

Acting Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, appointed by Yeltsin on Monday, faced 
strong criticism from the upper house of parliament. The lawmakers on 
Wednesday warned that the hostilities in Dagestan resemble the onset of 
Russia's botched war in Chechnya in 1994-96.

The Russian media have speculated that the Kremlin may use the fighting in 
Dagestan to introduce emergency measures that might result in the 
postponement of December's parliamentary elections. Yeltsin's allies are not 
expected to fare well in the polls.

Putin dismissed those allegations, saying Wednesday that there was no need 
for even a local state of emergency in Dagestan. But he indicated that the 
issue is not entirely out of the question.

``We may talk about the introduction of a state of emergency when it's 
necessary,'' he said after meeting at the upper house, the Federation Council.

Under Russian law, the Federation Council must sanction the president's 
decision to introduce a state of emergency, and the Russian media said Putin 
wanted to sound out lawmakers on the issue.

``Putin has received preliminary support of the Federation Council,'' the 
business daily Kommersant claimed, without citing its sources.

While voicing indignation over the latest Cabinet reshuffle, the fourth in 17 
months, most political factions appear willing to support Putin. The lower 
house of parliament is to vote on Putin's nomination on Monday and appears to 
be leaning toward approval.

If parliament rejects Putin's nomination three times, Yeltsin would be 
required to disband the legislature. But the Communists and other hard-liners 
who dominate parliament do not appear interested in a confrontation with 
Yeltsin as elections draw near.

Most observers believe the current shake-up is part of a Kremlin effort to 
undermine a new political alliance led by Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov. He is a 
leading presidential candidate who struck an alliance last week with a bloc 
of powerful regional governors.

The Kremlin does not want Luzhkov and his alliance to make a strong showing 
in the December elections, and Putin is now expected to try to lure the 
governors away from a coalition.

******

#6
Russia's regional ambitions threatened by Dagestan conflict

MOSCOW, Aug 12 (AFP) - Russia had little choice but to step in against Islami 
radicals to try to stop civil war breaking out in the small, multi-ethnic 
republic of Dagestan, analysts say.

This latest crisis in the northern Caucasus is another threat to Moscow's 
ambitions to cash in on the Caspian oil boom by bringing Azerbaijani oil 
through Russian territory.

"Dagestan is part of Russia. It's been invaded and the country will have to 
react to this," said Anatol Lieven, a specialist in the region with London's 
International Institute for Strategic Studies.

"It's not something from which Russia can simply withdraw. This is part of 
the national territory," he added.

"It's like the question of the British in Northern Ireland: how do you 
withdraw from a territory that doesn't want actually to be independent?"

Most people in Dagestan did not support what was happening, said Lieven. If 
Russia pulled out, the republic would slide into civil war.

"Dagestan as you know is divided between different nationalities. In other 
words, you are looking at something like Lebanon," he said.

The republic has more than 30 ethnic minorites in its two-million strong 
population, about half of whom are native peoples: some 500,000 Avars, 
270,000 Darghins and 200,000 Lezghians. Russians only make up about 10 
percent of the population.

Many analysts see the occupation last weekend of several villages in the 
south of the republic as the biggest threat to Moscow's authority since the 
Russo-Chechen war, which lasted from December 1994 to August 1996.

But Russia is not the only state that should be worrying. If the crisis in 
Dagestan deteriorated and if President Heydar Aliyev of neighbouring 
Azerbaijan died, there might also be ethnic conflict there, said Lieven.

A former Soviet republic, Azerbaijan's 170,000 Lezghians have in the past 
called for unification with their Dagestani cousins to form a Lezghian state.

Oil expert Euan Craik said the latest crisis threatened Russia wider 
ambitions in the region. "Obviously the conflict in Dagestan ruins Russia's 
plan to become a major transportation corridor for Azeri oil."

The precious oil pipeline linking the Azerbaijani capital Baku on the Caspian 
Sea with the Russian Black Sea port of Novorossiysk passes through both 
Dagestan and Chechnya.

It has been out of action for two months because of security fears and the 
theft of oil in the breakaway Chechen republic. Now Russia has proposed a new 
pipeline bypassing Chechnya but going through Dagestan.

It is the latest move in a high-stakes oil game being played in the Caucasus 
region against old rival the United States.

That is why the latest developments posed such a threat to Moscow, said 
Craik. "It's not just Russian financial interests that are hurt. It also 
weakens its geopolitical influence on former Soviet republics in the region." 

******

#7
Russia Jews to Monitor Anti-Semitism.

NEW YORK, August 12 (Itar-Tass) - A programme of monitoring anti-Semitism 
will be launched In Russia, Moscow's chief Rabbi Pinkhas Goldshmidt said here 
on Wednesday. 

The Russian Jewish Congress and the US-based Anti-Defamation League agreed to 
carry out jojnt efforts to monitor the conditions of Russia's Jews. 

Goldshmidt attended a briefing on problems of Russia's Jewish community that 
was conducted by the US' influential Jewish organisations. 

"All cases of anti-Semitism will be monitored," he said in an interview with 
Itar-Tass. 

"Besides, public opinion polls, which will be carried out in different layers 
of society and will involve not only Jews, will help judge about the 
condition of Jews in Russia. Then results will be summed up and 
recommendations made. This information will be sent to the government," 
Goldshmidt said. 

He said initiators of the programme had discussed their planned activities 
with the government's representatives. 

The need for monitoring the conditions of Russia's Jews is prompted by recent 
incidents that indicate the tenacity of anti-Semitism, Goldshmidt said. 

He said this tendency harbours a special danger this day, when political 
passions are rising before Russia's parliamentary elections due in December 
and the presidential elections to be held in June of 2000. 

"The rise of anti-Semitism is dangerous not only for Jews, it is dangerous 
for whole Russian society," Goldshmidt said. 

He said the coniditons of Jews had immeasurably improved as compared with 
Russia's imperial and Soviet eras, which testifies to the "movement of the 
country toward democracy", Godlshmidt said. 

However, Russia's leaders should immediately respond to all manifestations of 
anti-Semitism, and not limit themselves to statements about their intolerable 
attitudes toward anti-Semitism, he said. 

*******

#8
Date: Thu, 12 Aug 1999 
From: "wendell w. solomons" <solomons@slt.lk>
Subject: Advent of St. Putin the Dragon Slayer

Greetings!

>From Ira Straus:

"America needs to reflect on the unintended consequences of its decentralist 
rhetoric and practices. It needs to reconsider the habit of exporting its 
careless rhetoric and prejudices instead of its sounder mainstream practices 
and traditions. And it needs to consider major remedial action to repair its 
reputation in Moscow as an upholder not an undertaker of the unity of
Russia."

That is a sober trend of thought to follow.

Belgian professor Jacques de Groote saw the danger at the IMF before
chaotic decentralization. He tried to forestall it. I too was one of those
who in
July 1992 alerted Larry Summers, then Chief Economist of the IBRD, about his
protege Jeffrey Sachs' plan. I wrote, "If the blind lead the blind, both shall
fall into a ditch."

The crime of so blindly leading both America and Russia into a ditch
is so immense that hauling Summers and Sachs before a judge could hardly
undo the wrong. It is fundamentally a question of getting men like that
out of the way so that the two countries can go forward from blind man's
buff.

Sachs had even got his proportions wrong. He was used to figuring with the
resources of the 10-mln population South American country (Sachs was one of
the 'economists' who did the paper work in advance of Pinochet.) Without
an alert the situation in Russia can move towards formal dictatorship.

>From Russia Today, August 11, 1999, by Rod Pounsett:

"It's rumored that Putin's adoption by the Yeltsin inner circle was promoted
once again by former deputy premier Anatoly Chubais. It was Chubais who
brought Putin to Moscow in 1996 from St. Petersburg where he'd slipped into
the political frame as an aid to the former mayor of Russia's second city,
Anatoly Sobchak."

That Sachs' protege Anatoly Chubais is so mentioned would fit into a course
of events intended as insurance by the Yeltsin-Summers reform clique. The
price of reform failure all over Eastern Europe has been seen to favor votes
for dirigiste parties. In the case of Russia, the economic collapse has been
so immense that dirigistes would be forced by public opinion to call the
reform clique to account.

No doubt the image of Mr Putin can be promoted towards that of a Pinochet
or a Jaruzelski (of the Brezhnev doctrine) through an election-time slaying
of the new dragon that has made a timely call in Dagestan. It has already
been established how Western media and logistical solidarity, if induced
in Albright and Cohen, can quickly compel defeat as in Yugoslavia (i.e.,
avoiding the Afghanistan, Chechen and Vietnam scenarios.)

Yet, the emergence of a dictator would remove the last credence for the 
American people and the world of the democratization of Russia.

Obviously this a bizarre road to travel in the company of the reform clique.
Therefore the counsel of men such as Henry Kissinger serves today as reasoned
opinion as compared with the experimental geopolitics of a handful of mock
economists who try to cover the depth of their professional crime -- the
leading of both America and Russia into the ditch. This clique will sooner
or later clean up desks and retire from our view as Treasury Secy. Robert
Rubin wisely did this year. Therefore, it is a question of how much more
the escapades of these humbugs will send up the bill they are bequeathing
the two countries.

*******

#9
Timing of Yeltsin Choice of Putin Pondered 

Komsomolskaya Pravda
10 August 1999
[translation for personal use only]
Article by Vasiliy Ustyuzhanin: "War in the Caucasus--the 
Kremlin's Backup Option?" 

The sudden incursion of Khattab's and Basayev's 
militants into Dagestan and the new outbreak of armed conflict in the 
Caucasus have oddly coincided with the firing of the Stepashin cabinet. 
Which has afforded the opposition a pretext for once again talking about 
a long-mulled scenario, whose development is attributed to Kremlin 
analysts: Yeltsin is said to intend on the pretext of an exacerbation of 
the situation in the country to impose a state of emergency and then, by 
law, to cancel or postpone indefinitely the parliamentary and, possibly, 
the presidential elections. The war in Dagestan and its inevitable 
negative consequences (the threat to the constitutional system and the 
unity of the country, terrorist actions, and such) afford the president 
all the grounds for this. 

Viktor Ilyukhin, chairman of the Duma's Security Committee, was trying to 
persuade everyone yesterday that this is precisely how everything stands. 
He referred here to contacts that Basayev has allegedly had with members 
of the administration. He did not name the Kremlin personalities, it is 
true. But the weekly Versiya did--citing anonymous sources, it reported a 
recent secret meeting in France between Voloshin and Basayev, after which 
the new focal point of tension broke out in the Caucasus. 

So what, then, despite yesterday's statement of President Yeltsin that 
the elections would take place on 19 December, should Russia's citizens 
not be expecting to have their free say? In my view, a number of signs 
point to the fact that if the Kremlin is, indeed, studying such an 
option, it is thus far only as a backup. Many of the politicians whom I 
managed to contact yesterday are convinced that at this moment in time, 
at least, Boris Yeltsin sacredly believes that his choice is 100 percent 
correct and that Vladimir Putin, as his successor, will not let either 
himself or the Family or the ideals of democracy down. 

As for what will happen if the president suddenly realizes that he has 
made a mistake, see Ilyukhin's remarks.... 

******

#10
Ryzhkov Says Russia's Power Needs Reform 

MOSCOW, August 110 (Itar-Tass) -- Vladimir 
Ryzhkov, leader of the State Duma faction of Our Home is Russia (NDR) 
movement, said Russia's power needs serious reform. 

"Russia is in need of a serious reform of state power and of relationships 
between the president, government and parliament", he said at a news 
briefing in the grounds of the Duma lower house of parliament on Tuesday. 
Ryzhkov said "until such a reform is effected, any Russian government would 
experience the same difficulties as its predecessors did". 

He commented on Russian President Boris Yeltsin's appointing Vladimir 
Putin as acting prime minister, saying that Putin's acceptance with NDR 
was good, but a new cabinet was unlikely to improve Russia's situation. 
"We have respect for him: we is a very responsible, decent man, who has 
been through a good school of professionalism," Ryzhkov said. 

However, "it is difficult to suppose that the new cabinet will be able to 
radically break the situation in the present conditions", Ryzhkov said. 
He was asked about his view of President Boris Yeltsin's commending 
Putin as Russia's future president. 

"Putin, like any citizen of Russia, especially if he will hold the crucially 
responsible post of prime minister, has the possibility to claim the 
presidential post", Ryzhkov said. 

However, he added, "it will be more difficult for him than for all others to 
win in the elections because all others will only criticise and attack". 
Ryzhkov explained that, should the Duma confirm Putin as permanent prime 
minister, "he will be responsible for everything - and for the harvest 
and for the winter and for northern deliveries of food and goods and for 
the situation in the North Caucasus. 

******

#11
Russian Pundit: Putin Unlikely To Win 2000 Election 

NTV
August 10, 1999
[translation for personal use only]
Studio interview with Igor Bunin, Director of the Center of 
Political Technology, by Vitaliy Buzuyev -- live. 

[Presenter Vitaliy Buzuyev] We shall discuss the 
political consequences of the government crisis with well-known political 
analyst Igor Bunin, who is in our studio now. [Passage omitted: greetings] 
[Q] I have the impression that [Russian President] Boris Yeltsin is 
expecting a miracle from [newly appointed acting Prime Minister] Vladimir 
Putin. It is obvious that the latter can really become a successor to the 
incumbent president only under certain very special conditions. What 
Putin must do and what can he do to make this miracle a reality? 
[A] I think that Yeltsin was not expecting a miracle from Putin when he 
named him a successor, or was expecting it subconsciously. In my opinion, 
the sense of this appointment is quite different. Putin's task is not to 
win the [2000 presidential] election. I think it is politically 
impossible for him. His task is to monopolize all existing financial, 
information and administrative resources. This was the main purpose of 
Putin's appointment [acting prime minister]. 
There is little difference between Putin and [former Prime Minister 
Sergey] Stepashin: both are Leningraders, both belong to the democrats, 
both came to Moscow in the team of [architect of Russian liberal economic 
reform Anatoliy] Chubays. 
Anyway, some there are some differences. He [Putin] is 100 per cent loyal 
[to the president]. He is a team player in contrast with Stepashin who 
wanted some autonomy and was striving for this autonomy. 
The main point is that he [Putin] is ready to take more resolute action 
in the present situation than Stepashin was. The latter avoided certain 
conflicts and tried to ease them. I think that Putin will be tougher. 
[Q] The State Duma will discuss Putin's candidacy for prime minister on 
Monday, 16th August. Is it possible that the lower house of parliament 
will not confirm him? 
[A] His confirmation in the first round would be guaranteed by 100 per 
cent if the president had not named him his favoured heir. The reason is 
very simple: Putin would be apprehended as a merely technical prime 
minister, and the deputies' only concern is 19th December [the Duma 
election day]. [Passage omitted: repetition] 
Now there is some parallel with [former prime minister, Gazprom board of 
directors chairman and Our Home is Russia leader Viktor] Chernomyrdin. As 
you know, he was named heir in September 1998, and this ruined his 
chances. But I think that this parallel is not direct, because most 
people do not regard Putin as a real heir, in contrast with Chernomyrdin. 
So, he will definitely be confirmed in the second round, if not in the first. 
[Q] Now a few words about Sergey Stepashin. His dismissal was quite 
predictable, and he often made it clear that everything is possible. Of 
course, his last speech [at the cabinet session on 9th August] was full 
of bitterness and irritation. Will Stepashin's popularity rating rise in 
relation to recent events? Can he become an independent political figure 
now, or will he stay in the background? 
[A] Stepashin's rating depended on two factors. One of them was his 
prime minister's post, which always gives several percent, especially at 
the beginning. Another factor was his thoroughly balanced position. On 
the one hand, some distance from the Family [Boris Yeltsin's entourage]. 
On the other hand, loyalty [to Yeltsin], but not absolute. 
All this has improved his image. Moreover, society, at least part of it, 
wants a young reformer. 
Naturally, he cannot become a presidential hopeful after losing his post.
As 
for the political future in general, it is somewhat different. All 
[Russian] former prime ministers became politicians. [Yegor] Gaydar, 
[Viktor] Chernomyrdin, [Sergey] Kiriyenko, [Yevgeniy] Primakov - all of 
them went into politics. I think Stepashin will do the same. 
The only difference between Stepashin and Primakov is that Primakov is 
likely to head a big [electoral] bloc able of winning parliamentary 
election, and Stepashin's share is smaller parties like Right Cause, Our 
Home is Russia etc. [

******

#12
Moscow Times
August 12, 1999 
The Men Who Would Be King - Won't 
By Brian Whitmore
Staff Writer

Remember Sergei Shakhrai, Vladimir Shumeiko and Oleg Soskovets? 

Like acting Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, all three were publicly anointed 
as heirs to President Boris Yeltsin's throne - just like arguably more 
presidential figures such as Alexander Lebed and Boris Nemtsov. 

But like Lebed and Nemtsov, they still found that being named Yeltsin's 
political heir was a one-way ticket to the political wilderness. 

Almost from the moment Yeltsin came to power in 1991, naming his chosen 
successor has been a bit of a Kremlin parlor game - a game that is hazardous 
for the careers of the so-called "winners." Being named Yeltsin's heir - 
either by the president himself or by Moscow's chatty news media - has turned 
out to be the kiss of death. 

Following Yeltsin's announcement Monday that he wanted Putin to be Russia's 
next president, Gennady Seleznyov, the Communist speaker of the State Duma, 
said Yeltsin has "put an end to Putin's career." 

"All those whom Yeltsin once called his successor have no political future 
now," Seleznyov said. 

Previously, Yeltsin had only publicly ordained two successors, former Deputy 
Prime Minister Nemtsov and former Security Council Secretary Lebed. The news 
media - feeding on the ever-churning Kremlin rumor mill - has named many 
more, including prime ministers Viktor Chernomyrdin and Sergei Stepashin, who 
was fired to make way for Putin. 

"Yeltsin does not have long-lived favorites," Nemtsov said. 

He should know. In August 1994, when Nemtsov, then 34, was governor of Nizhny 
Novgorod, Yeltsin surprised reporters during a trip down the Volga River by 
giving Nemtsov an unambiguous presidential endorsement. 

"He has grown so much that you can already tap him for president," Yeltsin 
said with a grin. When Yeltsin brought Nemtsov into the Cabinet in March 
1997, saying the country needed "young energetic leaders," his poll numbers 
soared and pundits were proclaiming him Russia's next president. 

Just 17 months - and a default and devaluation - later, Nemtsov was a private 
citizen, having been fired along with Prime Minister Sergei Kiriyenko in 
August 1998. Today, his presidential prospects are considered slim and he 
leads a political party, Right Cause, that most pundits say will be 
hard-pressed simply to clear the 5 percent needed for representation in the 
State Duma. 

Nemtsov can take comfort in the fact that he is not alone. 

In 1996, when General Alexander Lebed came in third in the first round of 
presidential elections with 14.7 percent of the vote, Yeltsin - to boost his 
chances in a run-off against Communist Gennady Zyuganov - named the gruff 
paratrooper as head of his powerful Security Council. Asked at a Kremlin 
ceremony if Lebed was the person he would like to succeed him in 2000, 
Yeltsin replied "Yes." 

Lebed hit the ground running. He helped orchestrate the ouster of some of his 
rivals - including then Defense Minister Pavel Grachev - and won praise by 
negotiating a ceasefire in Chechnya. But Lebed also made the mistake of 
taking Yeltsin's presidential endorsement too seriously. Asked by reporters 
if he planned to be president in 2000, Lebed smiled and said "maybe earlier." 

In October 1996, just four months after his appointment, Lebed was fired by 
Yeltsin. Last year - despite stiff Kremlin opposition - Lebed was elected 
governor of the Krasnoyarsk region, although serious talk about him winning 
the presidency has dwindled. 

In January, Yeltsin said that he had, in fact, chosen a successor - but was 
keeping his choice to himself. "I do not intend to violate the Constitution, 
but I have made up my mind about a successor," Yeltsin said. "I now face the 
problem of when to announce it." 

Over the years, some of the speculation has been just plain silly. In 1993, 
for example, the media were full of speculation that Sergei Shakhrai, then a 
deputy prime minister, was the likely heir. 

But Yeltsin then said that his successor "had to be a tall person" - ending 
the presidential dreams of the diminutive Shakhrai. Such a criterion, 
incidentally, doesn't bode well for Putin, who is a full head shorter than 
the president. 

After Shakhrai, speculation turned to another, taller, figure: Vladimir 
Shumeiko, then speaker of the Federation Council, the upper chamber of the 
Russian parliament, who soon made a point of pointing out his height. 
Shumeiko's star faded when he lost his council seat in 1995. 

Yeltsin also reportedly thought Oleg Soskovets - an architect of the war in 
Chechnya and first deputy prime minister until he was fired in 1996 - was 
presidential material. During a meeting with then Belorussian Prime Minister 
Vyacheslav Kebich, Yeltsin was reported by news media as pointing to 
Soskovets and saying: "There is the future president of Russia!" Soskovets 
faded into obscurity after leaving government. 

One reason Yeltsin's favorites may fade is that Yeltsin himself is deeply 
unpopular. In theory, however, the Kremlin's control of money and news media 
could give a favored candidate a boost - if Yeltsin could just stop firing 
them. 

In fact, there's been some speculation that being fired was a good omen for 
Stepashin's future, potentially enabling him to run for president without 
being saddled with Yeltsin's baggage. 

Why all the talk of succession, anyway? Aren't the heads of state in 
democratic countries supposed to be elected, not appointed? 

"Russia isn't a monarchy, but the mechanism of transferring power here 
resembles a monarchy," said Andrei Ryabov a political analyst at the Moscow 
Carnegie Center who has written several articles on the issue of succession. 
"The only difference is that when Russia was a monarchy, the tsar didn't 
choose a successor, while Yeltsin thinks he needs to choose his." 

And then there is Yeltsin's inner circle, ominously referred to by the 
Russian media as "the family." This Kremlin court reportedly fears 
prosecution if they fail to keep Yeltsin, or a friendly successor, in power 
beyond July 2000. 

According to Ryabov, the family considered former Prime Minister Sergei 
Stepashin as electable - but not loyal. Putin, on the other hand, is loyal, 
but widely seen as unelectable. 

Ryabov said Yeltsin is bumping into a fundamental contradiction as his term 
nears its legal conclusion. On one hand, Ryabov said, Yeltsin sincerely wants 
to go down in history as the Russia's first democratically elected president 
who transferred power to a likewise democratically elected successor. On the 
other, he said, Yeltsin simply can't contemplate giving up power - as former 
Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev did in 1991. "I can't very well see him 
retiring to give lectures and write his memoirs like Gorbachev," Ryabov said. 

Yeltsin's conflicting impulses were evident in his speech Monday. 

"Next year, for the first time in the country's history, the first president 
of Russia will transfer power to a fresh, newly elected president," Yeltsin 
said. 

Then, regarding Putin, the president said: "I have confidence in him. And I 
want those who go to the polls next July to be confident in him as well," 
before saying, in what sounded like an order to voters, "Russians will 
support him." 

*******

#13
Investor's Business Daily
11 August 1999
[for personal use only]
Russia's Upheaval In The Kremlin Reflects A Very Battered Economy
As country tries to rebound, Yeltsin's new prime minister faces huge debts 
and unrest
By Jim Christie and Ed Carson

Like major world markets, Muscovites weren't too concerned by Russian 
President Boris Yeltsin's latest cabinet shake-up Monday. But then, both are 
accustomed to chaos by now.

Average Russians don't expect much. Russia's transition from communism 
to capitalism has been slow and tortuous. And it hasn't yet arrived.

''It's pre-capitalist,'' said Robert Conquest, noted Russian scholar and 
Hoover Institution fellow. ''People keep saying the economy has improved 
slightly, but it's the size of Denmark's.

''Ordinary living is no longer based on money, but on what people 
produce on their plots, and by paying the dentist by giving lessons to his 
children.''

Foreign investors also can't count on much in Russia - except disorder.
Included in Monday's firings was Prime Minister Sergei Stepashin - in 
office for just three months. Named to replace Stepashin is Vladimir Putin, 
an intelligence careerist. If approved by the Duma, Russia's lower house of 
parliament, Putin will be Yeltsin's fifth prime minister in 17 months.
Stepashin's firing was oddly timed. Russian armed forces were in 
firefights with Islamic rebels in the North Caucasus just hours before. By 
Tuesday, rebels in Dagestan province declared it an independent state.
That's a reminder of Moscow's tenuous hold over the Russian Federation's 
outer stretches and of a military bloodied by a revolt in little Chechnya. 
The army is still poorly fed, underpaid and suffering low morale.

''The central government doesn't have a lot of control outside Moscow 
and maybe St. Petersburg,'' said Gary Hufbauer, a senior analyst at the 
Institute for International Economics.
Also, Russia is trying to rise a year after the ruble collapsed. Its 
hat-in-hand diplomacy with Western creditors has underscored how feeble the 
country's prospects are.
An International Monetary Fund member for less than 10 years, Russia 
already is its biggest borrower. It owes the IMF nearly $17 billion.
Two weeks ago, the IMF OK'd a $4.5 billion loan to help Russia repay old 
debts. But the IMF made sure to keep the money out of Russia.

''The IMF is so wary, they aren't sending money there,'' said Michael 
Intriligator, a foreign member of the Russian Academy of Sciences who teaches 
economics at the University of California, Los Angeles.
The IMF doesn't want to get burned - like Germany, which lost over $40 
billion when Russian defaulted, according to Ariel Cohen, a Heritage 
Foundation analyst.
Will Putin press Yeltsin's pro-market policies?
Here's what Putin said: ''We have to move thoughtfully toward a market 
economy, but also use full-bloodedly the means of government regulation.''

That doesn't mean much for foreign investors, says T. Anthony Jones, 
associate director of the Gorbachev Foundation of North America. He points 
out there's little time for Yeltsin to make substantial reforms.

''There's no way the stability investors need can be created this side 
of the presidential elections next summer,'' Jones said. ''Yeltsin is a 
lame-duck president, so it'll be very difficult for economic legislation to 
be put through.

''Also, the fight against corruption and the tightening of fiscal 
responsibility, like tax collection, won't be possible until you have a prime 
minister with the respect of parliament.''

Jones' advice? ''If I were an investor, I'd stay away or do what they've 
been doing for the last 10 years: be there for the long term,'' he said.
That takes nerves of steel. Meanwhile, Russia's politics may grow more 
unstable as the presidential election nears.
The Duma, Russia's parliament, is still dominated by Communists. And 
average Russians have proved open to nationalistic appeals.

''Russia is looking to Latin America for models,'' Intriligator said. 
''Gen. Lebed, a popular political figure and governor of the Krasnoyarsk 
region (and a possible presidential candidate), looks to Chile and Pinochet. 
Yeltsin looks to Peru's Fujimori, who dismissed his parliament. Then the Duma 
looks to Ecuador, where parliament dismissed the president.''

How will Putin fit in to all this? He just may cause some economic 
sparks.

''He worked with Anatoly Chubais, the mastermind behind some of the 
various privatization schemes over the past few years,'' said Scott Parrish, 
a senior research associate at the Monterey Institute of International 
Studies in California.
Others say Putin is coming on board at a good time - if only because 
Russia might have hit bottom.
Also, an improving world economy eases Russia's problems. Underdeveloped 
neighbors are among the most vulnerable to another Russian meltdown, in terms 
of trade.
Germany is the No. 1 foreign investor in Russia. A better Euroland 
economy will help offset Russia-related losses, analysts say.
Also, Russia is showing some signs of growth. After last year's economic 
collapse, industrial output rose 9% year-over-year in June, up from 6.1% in 
May, said John Davitte, head of international market research with London- 
based IDEAglobal.com.
Exports also should rebound as energy and metals prices gain ground. 
Fortunately, ''Russia's leading gas and oil companies are working 
successfully,'' said Andrey Soubbotin, an economist with the Diplomatic 
Academy of Russia's Ministry of Foreign Affairs. 

*******