June 9, 2000    
This Date's Issues: 4356 • 4357 • 4358 • 4359

Johnson's Russia List
#4357
9 June 2000
davidjohnson@erols.com


[Note from David Johnson:
1. Los Angeles Times: Robert Hunter, Clinton Got What He Wanted 
>From Russia. Putin's stance on a shield system should help remove 
the issue from presidential politics in the U.S. 
2. Itar-Tass: RUSSIA SPELLS OUT ITS INITIATIVE ON EUROPEAN ABM SYSTEM.
3. Reuters: Moscow sees START-3 deal but renews ABM stance.
4. The Independent (UK): Sue Lloyd-Roberts, Great betrayal of Russia's old, cold and hungry.
5. Boston Globe: Brian Whitmore, Putin takes reins of power in Chechnya.
6. RFE/RL: Paul Goble, Chechenization.
7. Washington Post letter: Russia to the Rescue? (response to
Aksyonov on Chechnya)
8. Business Week: Paul Starobin, Putin Is Courting Everyone but the U.S..
9. Reuters: FACTBOX-Putin sets fast pace with foreign travel.
10. Reuters: Putin scores early wins in battle over tax reform.
11. The Guardian (UK): Paul Brown, NUCLEAR DUMP PLAN FOR RUSSIA.
12. Moskovsky Komsomolets: IDIOTS' BOX AS A MEANS OF COMBATING PUTIN.       Interview of Efficient Politics Foundation General Director Gleb PAVLOVSKY.
13. DAILY YOMIURI (Japan): Georgy Kunadze, CENTRAL ASIA'S PANDORA'S BOX.] 


******


#1
Los Angeles Times
June 9, 2000
[for personal use only]
Clinton Got What He Wanted From Russia 
Putin's stance on a shield system should help remove the issue from 
presidential politics in the U.S. 
By ROBERT E. HUNTER
Robert E. Hunter, a Former U.S. Ambassador to Nato, is a Senior Advisor at 
the Rand Corp. in Washington


President Clinton's first meeting with Vladimir V. Putin, the new 
Russian president, produced a dry, formal statement on strategic nuclear 
stability. But the fine print makes clear that Clinton gained what he needed 
to keep moving toward deployment of a limited national missile defense 
system. And Putin gained a role in helping to shape the outcome. 
For the first time, the Russian president formally acknowledged a basic 
U.S. argument: There is a "dangerous and growing threat of proliferation of 
weapons of mass destruction and their means of delivery." Putin accepted that 
the 1972 Antiballistic Missile Treaty was designed to consider possible 
"changes in the strategic situation" and, "as appropriate, to consider 
possible proposals for further increasing its viability." 
This obscure formulation was all that Clinton needed. Its import is 
that, without scrapping the ABM treaty, Russia is now prepared to consider 
measures to meet the new circumstances and has agreed with the U.S. "to take 
necessary steps to preserve strategic stability in the face of new threats." 
Teams from both sides will start meeting immediately on the full range 
of offensive and defensive arms issues. Behind these diplomatic 
circumlocutions lies a significant climb-down by Putin--a fact leading to 
charges of betrayal by Moscow hard-liners. Yet it is based on two realities: 
that the U.S. is bent on building some form of national missile defense, and 
that Putin must try to avoid becoming enmeshed in U.S. presidential politics. 
He has no better idea than anyone else whether he will have to deal with Al 
Gore or George W. Bush as president. 
By opening the door to revision of the ABM treaty, Putin meets Gore's 
desire to continue with the limited Clinton missile defense system, designed 
to protect the U.S. against a handful of missiles launched either by accident 
or by an obdurate country like North Korea. And Putin offers Bush an 
opportunity to develop his own thinking on national missile defense, without 
automatically crashing head-on into Russia's opposition to scrapping the ABM 
treaty. 
Putin's carefully worded concession to Clinton also may ease the U.S. 
dilemma with European allies, who have objected, almost unanimously, to U.S. 
missile defense plans precisely because they see the risk of eroding nascent 
strategic relations between NATO and Russia. Further, in proposing that 
missile defenses be developed jointly with the West, Putin is playing to a 
widespread desire in Europe to focus, at least at first, on defending 
military forces rather than the far more expensive and problematic goal of 
defending populations. 
Putin's proposal also plays to Russian military fears that the current 
U.S. missile defense program, once started, would naturally proceed to the 
point of eroding the effectiveness of Russia's nuclear deterrent. U.S. 
officials deny this latter possibility, but both physics and the rhetoric of 
some Bush advisors give some credence to Russian fears. 
Meanwhile, in the wings, China is watching carefully what the U.S. does 
about missile defense as Beijing considers how large--and how menacing--an 
offensive nuclear arsenal to build. 
What Putin has done poses a choice for Bush. Bush can see his potential 
presidency as starting off on a positive and cooperative note with Moscow, in 
the expectation that some national missile defense program can go forward 
without causing the collapse of three decades of bipartisan effort to create 
U.S.-Soviet strategic stability. Or he can listen to those of his advisors 
who continue to hanker after Ronald Reagan's thoroughly discredited notion of 
a "Star Wars" missile shield, which could produce radical new uncertainties 
in the worldwide nuclear environment. 
The Clinton-Putin summit thus opened up the chance of getting right the 
new, post-Cold War offense-defense nuclear equation. It also offers the 
chance of taking some of the heat out of current discussions so that the U.S. 
finally can have the wide-ranging national debate on halting the spread of 
mass destruction weapons--developing a strategy within which missile defense 
is a component, along with controlling technology, enhancing deterrence and 
trying to resolve political conflicts. 
The right U.S. response to the Clinton-Putin agreement in Moscow is to 
take the national missile defense issue out of the U.S. election campaign and 
put it back into the channels of critical analysis and careful diplomacy 
where it belongs. 


******


#2
RUSSIA SPELLS OUT ITS INITIATIVE ON EUROPEAN ABM SYSTEM
ITAR-TASS 


Moscow, 9th June: Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov made public on
Friday [9th June] the essence of Russia' proposals for cooperation in the
field of creating a nonstrategic antiballistic missile defence system in
Europe. 


Russia suggests as follows: 


- jointly assess the character and scale of missile proliferation and
possible missile threats; 


- jointly develop the concept of an all-European system of nonstrategic
ABM, the order of its creation and deployment; 


- jointly create an all-European multilateral centre for warnings about
missile launchings; 


- conduct joint staff exercises, research and experiments; 


- jointly develop systems of nonstrategic antimissile defence. 


It is possible that "a nonstrategic ABM system for joint or coordinated
activities for defence of peacekeeping forces and peaceful population"
might be created, Ivanov said. 


Russia is prepared for even closer interaction, Ivanov stressed at a press
conference. "We propose conducting corresponding consultations with the
countries of Western Europe on these problems," Ivanov said. 


******


#3
Moscow sees START-3 deal but renews ABM stance
By Andrei Shukshin

MOSCOW, June 9 (Reuters) - Russia said on Friday Moscow and Washington
could agree on new sweeping cuts in their nuclear arsenals before 2001, but
renewed its opposition to U.S. plans to amend the landmark 1972
Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. 


Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov denied Russia had effectively dropped its
objections to U.S. plans to modify the pact and build an anti-missile
defence system by signing a joint statement speaking about new security
threats. 


``The statement speaks about potential threats. Our position is that today
there are no such threats,'' he told a news conference presenting Moscow's
views on President Vladimir Putin's weekend summit with U.S. President Bill
Clinton. 


``That is why we say that if such a threat emerges, no matter where it
comes from, dealing with it would require international cooperation,
because it would not be a threat for the United States alone,'' Ivanov said. 


Washington says it wants to amend the ABM treaty because it fears a
possible surprise missile attack against its territory from so-called
``rogue states'' such as North Korea. 


Russia says the plan will compromise global stability and prefers the idea
of non-strategic interceptors placed close to potential aggressors. It says
such a system would protect not only the United States but also the whole
of Europe. 


Russia says its plan would not violate the ABM treaty. 


Moscow fears that by building a national anti-ballistic missile system,
Washington will reduce the role of Russia's vast but ageing nuclear arsenal
as a global deterrent. 


RUSSIA SEES ARMS CUTS IN 2000 


At the same time, Russia lacks funds to maintain its stock of nuclear
missiles and is engaged in talks with the United States on cutting their
number. 


Ivanov said that despite Washington dragging its feet on ratifying all
aspects of the START-2 treaty, which would slash U.S. and Russian nuclear
warheads to about 3,500 each by 2007, Moscow expected a new START-3 pact to
be sealed in 2000. 


``We consider it possible to reach concrete agreement with the United
States on START-3 before the end of this year,'' he said. Russia itself has
fully ratified START-2. 


The two sides agreed in 1997 in Helsinki to reduce the number of their
warheads to 2,000-2,500 under a new START-3 treaty, but Moscow has said it
would like to go even lower. 


``We have reconfirmed (to Clinton) that we are ready to lower the nuclear
warhead threshold agreed in Helsinki to 1,500 units, but, naturally, it is
going to be the subject of serious negotiations,'' Ivanov said. 


The new cuts would only possible as long as the main clauses of the ABM
treaty remained intact. 


Ivanov also elaborated on Putin's proposal for a pan-European anti-missile
shield, first outlined in a pre-summit interview with NBC television and
then repeated during a visit to Rome this week. 


He said Moscow did not intend to make Europe dependent on it but wanted
full-scale cooperation. 


Russian proposals to Europeans, Ivanov said, included jointly studying
global missile threats, working out a defence concept and ultimately
designing non-strategic anti-missile systems. 


Ivanov also suggested setting up a joint European centre to monitor and
exchange information about missile launches, similar to the one Russia and
the United States agreed to set up in Moscow at the weekend summit. 


The U.S.-Russian centre would be able to monitor not only launches made by
the two countries but also from anywhere else in the world, he said. 


******


#4
The Independent (UK)
9 June 2000
[for personal use only]
Great betrayal of Russia's old, cold and hungry 
Frontline 
By Sue Lloyd-Roberts 


Valery brings out an old jacket bristling with medals. "This one is for hard 
work. This one marks me as a Labour Veteran and this one is for services to 
the Great Patriotic War." 


He is not seeking admiration. He scoffs at them, saying: "They mean nothing 
to me now." He shows them only to explain what the old of Archangel mean by 
the Great Betrayal. The state has fobbed them off with medals while they 
cannot afford to buy bread. 


Archangel, trapped by polar ice for six months of the year, was considered a 
hardship posting by the Soviet state. Workers and their families were tempted 
to the timber trade by wages well above those in central Russia. Now the 
state industry has collapsed, the young and healthy have moved south to more 
prosperous and warmer areas, and the old are left. 


Today there is one birth for eight deaths, and two-thirds of the people are 
over 50. Old people gaze vacantly from the windows and balconies of the block 
of flats they share with Valery and his wife, Elena. The thawing snow has 
churned up the mud surrounding the housing estate. 


Elena started work at 14, digging trenches during the war. Her health was 
ruined and the couple have no children. But at least they had money to save 
for a comfortable old age and a decent burial. After all, between them, they 
had worked almost 100 years for the Soviet state. 


Two years ago, Valery went to the bank to get money for painkilling drugs 
Elena needs. The money had gone. The rouble had crashed and they have 
nothing. 


Stepping cautiously through the mud, 77-year-old Valery can still make the 
hour's tram journey across the city every day to collect a meal from the Red 
Cross soup kitchen. On his return, he pours the stew from glass jam-jars into 
the bowls Elena has ready. The daily ritual is survival, and it breaks the 
monotony. Their two-room flat is bare apart from a black and white television 
set on which they watch Brazilian soap operas dubbed into Russian. Everything 
else has been sold for food. They are marking time until relieved by death. 


"I have all the cotton wool and the clean clothes ready for us," says Elena. 
"If I go first, he won't know what to do." But without children and without 
money, they don't know who will bury them. 


I check at the undertaker. The clerk of deaths, as old and wizened as his 
customers, is writing and refuses to look at me. "The state will pay," he 
mutters. "They won't get fancy headstones, but we'll bury them." So there 
will be some recognition for the 100 years' labour. 


Pre-revolutionary, wooden houses still line the streets in the old city, 
icicles melting off finely carved gables and shutters. In the 19th century, 
Scottish timber traders lived here beside wealthy Russian merchants. 


Galina, 77, is at number nine. Her neighbour Natasha, an incredible 99, drops 
in for tea. "I should be dead," shouts Natasha. "Yes, it's taking a long 
time," yells Elena. The cruel irony is that an environment with winter 
temperatures 20 degrees below freezing breeds them tough. Here, old age 
continues beyond the appetite for life. 


At the local state institution for the old, they sleep six to a dormitory 
with crude commodes beside each bedstead. 


This is the generation who saw 20 million comrades die in the Great Patriotic 
War. To survive, as soldier or civilian, meant unimaginable hardship. They 
can be forgiven for expecting more than this. No wonder they call it the 
Great Betrayal. 


Sue Lloyd-Roberts' film on Archangel will be shown on 'Correspondent', BBC2, 
tomorrow at 6.50pm
******


#5
Boston Globe
9 June 2000
[for personal use only]
Putin takes reins of power in Chechnya 
By Brian Whitmore


MOSCOW - In a sign that the Kremlin intends to rule Chechnya with an iron
hand 
for as long as it takes to suppress separatist rebels, President Vladimir V. 
Putin yesterday took personal control over the rebel province's day-to-day 
affairs.


Putin's declaration of presidential rule in Chechnya, analysts here said, was 
a signal that the Kremlin does not intend to negotiate with the separatists 
after waging war on them for eight months.


''Russian power has returned to Chechnya forever,'' said Sergei Ivanov, 
secretary of Putin's Security Council, in televised comments. ''The president 
has taken upon himself full powers over Chechnya.''


Officials in Moscow said the step would make the region easier to govern. But 
with the Chechen rebels stepping up guerrilla raids on Russian forces, 
analysts said Moscow was in for a drawn-out conflict against angry and 
battle-hardened fighters with nothing to lose.


It was not clear how Chechnya's war-weary population will react. The Kremlin 
said presidential rule could last up to three years. In 1997, Chechens 
elected Aslan Maskhadov president in a vote that international observers 
called free and fair, and one that Moscow recognized as legitimate. Since 
then, however, the Kremlin has branded Maskhadov a criminal and refused his 
repeated calls for peace talks. 


''The Russian authorities have ruled out any negotiations with the resistance 
in Chechnya,'' said Pavel Felgenhauer, a Moscow-based defense analyst.


Putin's decree said Chechnya would be run by a provisional government headed 
by a Kremlin-appointed official answerable only to him.


Putin is expected to name his choice in a matter of days. The 
state-controlled RTR television station reported that the leading candidate 
was Nikolai Koshman, who served as Moscow's representative to the region 
until his post was abolished yesterday. Putin is also considering appointing 
a Chechen who is loyal to Moscow, RTR reported.


''If they appoint a pro-Moscow Chechen, who will of course be a figurehead, 
this will be presented to the world as a move toward a peaceful settlement. 
If they appoint Koshman, nothing will change except Koshman's title,'' 
Felgenhauer said.


He and other analysts said Russia is so detested by Chechens that no 
Kremlin-appointed government could wield enough authority to halt guerrilla 
ambushes against Russian troops in a conflict that has provoked gruesome 
atrocities on both sides.


The human rights group Amnesty International said yesterday that Russian 
forces in Chechnya routinely rape, torture, and beat civilians.


''They are raped, beaten with hammers and clubs, tortured with electric 
shocks and tear gas, their teeth are sawed and some are beaten around both 
ears simultaneously to burst the ear drums,'' the organization said in a 
statement. 


''So many people have been killed by the Russians, had their relatives 
killed, or had their property burned and looted,'' Felgenhauer said. ''There 
is so much hatred toward the Russians now,'' 


The military claims to have defeated all but a handful of the rebels, but the 
highly mobile fighters have waged a fierce guerilla campaign, killing 15 to 
20 Russian soldiers a week. Attacks on Russian positions are an almost daily 
occurrence.


One Russian soldier was killed yesterday when his armored truck was blown up 
by a radio-controlled mine. A top Russian military commander, Valery 
Konovalov, was wounded Wednesday when rebels fired on his car southwest of 
the republic's capital Grozny. Also Wednesday, two Russian police officers 
were killed in a suicide attack by rebels who drove a car filled with 
explosives into a police station in the town of Alkhan-Yurt.


******


#6
Russia: Analysis From Washington -- Chechenization 
By Paul Goble


Washington, 8 June 2000 (RFE/RL) -- The Russian military commander in 
Chechnya has called for Chechens to take over the fighting against the 
insurgents, a move that might reduce Russian casualties and thus political 
pressure to end the war but also one that could point to the future defeat of 
pro-Moscow forces there.


Speaking to the Russian media on Tuesday, Colonel-General Gennady Troshev 
said that Russian politicians "start[ed] the war and should -- and must -- 
end it." And the commander of Russian forces in Chechnya added that the best 
way to do so quickly would be to create a Chechen government that would 
continue the struggle against those he called "terrorists."


Troshev's proposal reflects growing concern in both the Russian military and 
the Russian government that rising Russian casualty rates will sap public 
support for the nine-month-long military effort in Chechnya and force Moscow 
into political concessions, just as popular anger against such losses did at 
the end of the Russian-Chechen conflict in 1996.


In recent months, many of the same groups -- human rights activists and the 
Soldiers' Mothers Committees -- have again raised their voices against 
continuing the war, and the international community, most recently during 
U.S. President Bill Clinton's visit to Moscow, has called for a political 
settlement of the conflict.


But Troshev's proposal seems certain to raise questions about whether the 
Chechenization of this conflict would in fact work. Or would such a policy, 
as the U.S.-sponsored Vietnamization program did in Southeast Asia a 
generation ago, simply open the door to the collapse of Russian power in 
Chechnya?


No one in Moscow can be encouraged by recent developments. The Russian 
authorities have had to disarm supposedly pro-Moscow Chechen units lest the 
latter go over to the pro-independence Chechen fighters. Moreover, Moscow has 
had to distance itself from ever more Chechen leaders with whom it earlier 
thought it could cooperate.


And consequently, turning the war over to Chechens who say they support 
Moscow now not only might encourage the pro-independence forces to step up 
their fight but also lead a new, nominally pro-Moscow Chechen government to 
make compromises with pro-independence groups that no Russian politician 
could. 


Precisely because such outcomes appear so likely, Troshev's comments this 
week point to three larger issues. 


First, Troshev's proposal calls attention to the increasing war weariness of 
the Russian military which cannot defeat its opponent except at losses 
commanders increasingly are unwilling to sustain. 
Since the bombing campaign ended, Russian forces have moved into southern 
Chechnya, a mountainous region where Chechen defenders have enormous tactical 
advantages over Russian attackers because the latter cannot bring to bear 
their technological advantages over the Chechens. 


Second, Troshev's call suggests that he and other Russian military commanders 
are now ever more prepared to challenge the policies of President Vladimir 
Putin. Having been one of his greatest backers in the past, the Russian army 
-- or at least some of its leading commanders -- may now be prepared to 
demand that he make some concessions to them. 
Such willingness on the part of commanders is the unintended consequence of 
Putin's ever more obvious reliance on the security agencies and especially 
his appointment of generals to head many of the new federal districts he has 
created.


Putin can counter this only by either turning away from the security forces 
as such or attempting to play the non-military security agencies against the 
military, a move that would inevitably trigger memories of the Soviet use of 
the secret police against the army.


And third, Troshev's proposal -- or at least the apparent reasons behind it 
-- suggests that the Russian people are not prepared to commit to a long war 
in the northern Caucasus, however much support they may have shown for the 
campaign initially. 


As a result, Troshev's call for Chechenization this week may generate the two 
things he clearly most wants to avoid: ever greater opposition to the war 
among Russians and an ever greater willingness by the Chechens to continue 
the fight. 


******


#7
Washington Post
June9, 2000
Letter
Russia to the Rescue?

Vassily Aksyonov writes [op-ed, May 30] that Russia is engaged in a "rescue 
operation" in Chechnya and that "the Western media" have put a Russophobic 
spin on the war and as such are responsible for the worsening relations 
between Russia and the West. In fact the Western media--and 
policymakers--have accepted Russia's line on the conflict by agreeing that 
the war is to protect Russia's territorial integrity. 


>From the Chechens' perspective, this war is anti-colonial resistance. 
Chechens always have had a unique animosity toward Russian rule. The Russian 
conquest of the North Caucasus was the bloodiest and most protracted Russian 
imperial expansion, and the Chechens never accepted defeat.


Chechens staged major uprisings in 1877-78 and in 1920-21. They assassinated 
pre-KGB secret police agents. They staged a mass uprising against 
collectivization--so serious that the Red Army had to be sent in. They 
mounted another insurrection in the early 1940s that ended with two Soviet 
air raids. Then, at the end of World War II, the entire nation was deported 
to Central Asia for supposed collaboration with the Nazis. No other people 
have been as actively and continually hostile to Russian rule.


Russia says that Chechnya is an integral part of Russia but then commits an 
atrocious war against--by its own claims--its own people, without 
discriminating between civilian and soldier, in the process razing a city of 
364,000.


Mr. Aksyonov boasts that "Russia managed to get rid of totalitarianism by its 
own effort." But communism collapsed from within and was not put to death by 
a strong democratic movement.


Problematic reform, rampant criminality and a meteoric rise of a former KGB 
man to president, solely based on his ability to bomb Chechnya to ashes, are 
the reasons for the creeping negativity toward Russia--not pro-Chechen 
Western media.


THOMAS M. BARRETT
Alexandria


*****


#8
Business Week
June 19, 2000
[for personal use only]
Russia: Putin Is Courting Everyone but the U.S.
By Paul Starobin in Moscow, with Kate Carlisle in Rome 
EDITED BY ROSE BRADY 


It could have been just a fluke in two Presidential agendas. But when Bill 
Clinton and Vladimir V. Putin finished talking on June 4, it was the Russian 
leader who left Moscow first. Putin hastily departed for Italy and two days 
of meetings with political and business leaders. His visit produced 
agreements on trade credits worth up to $1.5 billion for Russia. That 
contrasted sharply with the not-much-new tone of the Putin-Clinton summit.
Just a month after his inauguration, Putin's foreign realpolitik is coming 
into focus. If America expects little from Russia these days, Putin is 
signaling that the feeling is mutual. During Clinton's visit, the Russian 
leader made no pleas for economic assistance--a staple of the relationship 
under Boris N. Yeltsin, Putin's predecessor. Instead, Putin is recultivating 
neglected relations with other nations. He's actively courting three main 
blocs: selected Western European countries, the former Soviet 
Republics--including the energy-rich Caspian Sea states--and Asian giants 
China and Japan. While Moscow cannot match Washington's global reach, Putin's 
strategy is to strengthen Russia's position as a regional power.
Putin's objectives in Europe are primarily commercial. Russia's trade with 
Europe for the first nine months of last year totaled $37.7 billion--seven 
times the $5.1 billion in U.S.-Russian trade. In the same period, both 
Switzerland and the Netherlands invested more in Russia than the U.S. did. 
Merloni, the Italian home-appliance manufacturer, announced on June 3 that it 
will pay $120 million for Stinol, Russia's biggest maker of refrigerators, 
and spend $50 million over the next three years to expand production. That's 
the biggest deal to come Russia's way since its August, 1998, financial 
crisis.
Putin's Italy trip is evidence of a central feature of his strategy: He's 
favoring nations that have gone easy on Moscow in such matters as the war in 
Chechnya while downplaying ties with critics, such as France. It's paying 
off. While he was in Milan, Putin visited Eni, which is building a $2 billion 
pipeline with Russia's Gazprom to carry Russian gas to Turkey via the Black 
Sea. The Italian-Russian venture is being propelled by $1 billion in loans 
from Italian banks--all of them guaranteed by SACE, the Italian export agency.
Putin is moving just as aggressively in Central Asia. While new nations 
such as Uzbekistan are wary of the Russian bear, they are accepting Putin's 
offers of security guarantees because they are even more fearful of Islamic 
insurgencies. In May, Uzbek President Islam Karimov signed a pact with Russia 
strengthening military cooperation. And while U.S. energy companies are 
progressing slowly in the Caspian, Russia and Turkmenistan are close to a 
30-year pact guaranteeing major Russian gas purchases.
LITTLE DESIRE. Then there's East Asia. Putin will visit Beijing in July en 
route to the Group of Eight summit in Nago, Japan. Beijing seeks missile 
technology from Russia, suggesting a partnership that could threaten U.S. 
interests in the region. Japan may prove tougher. The stumbling block to 
improved ties--Russia's half-century occupation of the Kuril Islands, which 
Japan claims--remains unresolved. Still, Japan's Ministry of International 
Trade & Industry and the Japan Bank for International Cooperation have 
guaranteed $600 million in loans by Japanese banks on the Eni-Gazprom 
pipeline project. ``Tokyo has more in common with Moscow than with 
Washington,'' Alexander Panov, Russia's ambassador to Japan, recently 
declared.
Putin seems to have little desire to drift toward confrontation with the 
U.S. But he may be trying to capitalize on vague fears of American hegemony 
that many countries, even some U.S. allies, seem to share. Putin is playing a 
weak hand well: For Russia, there's life beyond America.


******


#9
FACTBOX-Putin sets fast pace with foreign travel

MOSCOW, June 9 (Reuters) - Russian President Vladimir Putin, elected in 
March, has marked his first months in office with a flurry of foreign trips 
and there is no let-up in sight. 


He visited Britain, Belarus and Ukraine in April, the ex-Soviet states of 
Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan in May and Italy earlier this week. Following is 
a list of Putin's planned foreign visits: 


June 13-14 - Spain. 


June 15-16 - Germany, where Putin served in the East as a KGB spy in 1980s. 


June 17 - Ex-Soviet republic of Moldova. 


July 5 - Summit of the so-called Shanghai Five states, also including China, 
Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan, in the Tajik capital Dushanbe. 


July 18 - China. 


July 19 or 20 - North Korea, first by a Kremlin chief. 


July 21-23 - G8 summit in Okinawa, Japan. 


Late August - Japan on a separate trip agreed by him and Japanese Prime 
Minister Yoshiro Mori in St Petersburg in April. 


Around this time Putin is also likely to visit South Korea. 


September - New York for millennium conference. 


October - India to sign a strategic partnership agreement. 


November - Asian-Pacific summit in Brunei. 


Putin has received many invitations from foreign leaders to visit their 
countries, including Poland and France. 


******


#10
Putin scores early wins in battle over tax reform
By Peter Graff


MOSCOW, June 9 (Reuters) - Russian President Vladimir Putin scored early 
victories in a showdown in parliament on Friday over a bill that would 
tighten the federal government's grip on billions of dollars in social 
spending. 


Communists, trade unions and regional bosses have vowed to oppose Putin's 
plans, which would combine funds that control sums equal to nearly 40 percent 
of all wages paid in Russia and place their revenues under centralised 
control. 


But in early votes on two amendments the State Duma, the lower house of 
parliament, appeared willing to accept changes that go even deeper than a 
government compromise plan offered this week. 


Putin has already succeeded in securing passage of the first part of his tax 
reform plan, a 13 percent flat income tax, on its key second reading in the 
Duma on Wednesday. 


But he has faced stronger opposition to his plans to unify the various social 
taxes -- a far larger sum, which is now collected according to a Byzantine 
system that many say offers officials opportunities to divert funds for their 
own gain. 


Under Putin's plan, contributions to social spending funds would be collected 
as regular taxes, sidestepping vast fund bureaucracies that have been a 
source of political patronage for labour unions and regional leaders. 


The government insists the moves will make the system more efficient without 
hurting beneficiaries of social spending, which covers not only pensions and 
health care but also paid vacations, summer camps, child benefits and 
funerals. 


In a sign that the Duma was likely to come out in favour of the reforms, the 
house voted to amend the bill so that, if passed, it would apply to all of 
Russia's main social funds next year. The government had offered as a 
compromise this week to let the largest fund, the pension fund, be exempt 
until 2003. 


The Duma also adopted an amendment going further than government proposals in 
cutting the social tax payable on higher incomes, to as low as two percent. 
The entire amended bill was likely to come up for a vote later on Friday. 


The tax reform is part of a broad political reform plan to concentrate power 
in the hands of the federal authorities. Putin has also asked parliament for 
the power to sack regional bosses and strip them of seats in parliament's 
upper house. 


UNION LEADER OPPOSES TAX MOVE 


Labour union leader Mikhail Shmakov, one of the tax plan's main opponents, 
told the Duma maintaining separate funds for social spending was ``a matter 
of principle.'' 


``The question is whether we will maintain the system that has operated in 
our country since 1903,'' he said. ``Taxes are the property of the state, 
while contributions to the funds are the property of the funds.'' 


Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov defended the plans to the country on 
Thursday, telling ORT: ``There is no question of cutting any social benefits, 
no question of the money being diverted to plug holes in the budget.'' 


About 100 labour supporters gathered outside the Duma on Friday to protest 
against the bill. 


The Federation Council, parliament's upper house which is made up of regional 
bosses, voted on Thursday to recommend the Duma not pass the bill, a sign 
Putin may need a two-thirds majority in the Duma to avoid a veto by the upper 
chamber. 


Foreign advisers and Russian liberals have long pushed for tax reforms that 
would remove loopholes, simplify collection and lower rates to encourage 
people to pay. The Duma killed two previous tax reform plans under then 
President Boris Yeltsin. 


After years of falling production and chronic budget deficits, Russia's 
economy has recovered on the strength of high world prices for its oil 
exports and a 1998 devaluation of the rouble currency that made the country 
less dependent on imports. 


Kasyanov said the economy remained robust in the first quarter of 2000, with 
both tax collection rates and central bank reserves increasing. But he said 
reforms were needed if the recovery were to be sustained. 


******


#11
The Guardian (UK)
9 June 2000
[for personal use only]
NUCLEAR DUMP PLAN FOR RUSSIA
By Paul Brown


A controversial plan to use Russia, a country struggling to cope with the
consequences of its ageing nuclear arsenal, as a storage depot for 10,000
tonnes of the globe's spent nuclear fuel is being actively developed in
Washington and Moscow. 


Five countries - Taiwan, South Korea, Mexico, the Netherlands and
Switzerland - have expressed interest in sending the fuel to Russia to be
placed in specially constructed stores where it would be kept safe and
prevented from being used for nuclear weapons. 


As part of the deal, the Russians would agree to halt plans to commercially
reprocess spent fuel, assuring that it would make no more plutonium
available for nuclear weapons. 


Minatom, the Russian nuclear power agency, suggested in April a 20-year
moratorium on reprocessing in exchange for the US helping Russia to build a
dry store. Russia has the expertise to deal with spent fuel, but it has no
money to build the storage facility. 


The plan would generate an estimated Dollars 15bn ( pounds 10bn) in fees
during the first 10 years. This foreign exchange would provide the funding
to build enough space for the 10,000 tonnes of fuel and solve the problem
of what to do with Russia's increasing stockpile of fuel from reactors -
believed already to be 14,000 tonnes. 


The idea has influential backers in the US and Russia, including
endorsement from senior environmental figures such as Tom Cochran, the
director of nuclear programmes at the National Resources Defence Council
(NRDC), but some green groups are appalled by the idea. 


'The world has huge problems with nuclear waste but sending it to Russia is
not the answer,' Michael Mariotte, the executive director of the Nuclear
Information Resource Service, said. 'The plan really represents the
ultimate in 'not in my back yard' thinking.' 


Vladimir Slivyak, of Russia's Ecodefence, an umbrella group of 300
environmental organisations, said: 'We are shocked by the proposals which
have nothing in common with environmental principles and unethically
promote the interests of western nuclear industry, whose main concern is to
get rid of its nuclear waste.' 


Mr Slivyak said Yevgeny Adamov, Russia's minister for nuclear power, has
included the building of 23 nuclear reactors in Russia as part of the
programme. 


'These reactors are dangerous and not needed. Energy-efficient technologies
do not exist on an industrial scale in Russia,' Mr Slivyak said.
'Development of renewable sources of energy would provide Russia with a
great amount of energy as well. But efficiency and renewables do not have
great lobbyists as one of the richest corporations of the world - Minatom -
has.' 


Still, the NRDC's Dr Cochran remains squarely behind the initiative. 'It
would stop reprocessing in Russia for at least a couple of decades; it
would aid nuclear non-proliferation by removing fuel from countries like
Taiwan. It would also solve storage problems for countries in earthquake
zones. The income stream [it would create] could cure a lot of problems in
Russia.' 


He said the five countries had expressed an interest in the scheme because
it would solve their problems on what to do with spent nuclear fuel. 


******


#12
Moskovsky Komsomolets
June 9, 2000
[translation from RIA Novosti for personal use only]
IDIOTS' BOX AS A MEANS OF COMBATING PUTIN
Interview of Efficient Politics Foundation General 
Director Gleb PAVLOVSKY

Question: How independent is Vladimir Putin in his 
decision-making?
Answer: Putin's personal independence is evident to all. 
He has been one of the most obstinate clients during his 
election campaign. Yeltsin has been more flexible, 
incidentally. 
I cannot visualize Putin being herded by any one group. 
And he differs from Chubais who has but one team he always 
takes along. The people who have come to power with Putin, the 
ones he came across in the past, are now playing different 
roles and are not seen by him as a single team...
Take Yeltsin's teams. He has had three. When going away, 
each team would retain some of its members in the Kremlin. The 
first team - its members are now referred to as the "old 
democrats" - tackled the task of taking power in the course of 
the democratic mutiny. The second one - in the epoch of 
Korzhakov, Barsukov and Borodin - attempted to form a court for 
Yeltsin a democratic Czar and live comfortably. The third team 
- the team of a retiring Yeltsin - was the revolution's 
"liquidation committee." 
Putin could not have possibly inherited it - his project 
is different. The project is the state - it is effectively 
non-existent and has to be built anew. In so doing, Putin 
cannot rely on any of the old teams. Revolutionary merits are 
not enough in the state building. 
Incidentally, the Voloshin-Putin tandem had shaped even 
before Putin was made the acting president. There is an 
interconnection - working and intellectual. I do not know 
whether it will last. But it is an element of a new team... 

Question: If the president is so independent, how come a 
half of the Cabinet are people close to Abramovich, and the 
other, people close to Chubais?
Answer: Do you think Putin is obliged to "give birth" to 
new politicians? People like him care not at all about old sins 
and old merits. He sees the former politicians as a personnel 
pool to be drawn from at will. 

Question: The bureaucrats' pasts are one thing, their 
present is another. They have not ruptured their ties to 
oligarchs or have they?
Answer: Putin leaves no freedom of maintaining ties; if he 
takes them into the team, it is on his own conditions. No 
chaotic ties.

Question: How do you visualize Putin's relationships with 
oligarchs once he builds his system?
Answer: It looks as if there will be several big business 
conglomerates and the state will be devising its economic 
strategies in constant communication with them. It is not 
unlike the South Korean model - that of large conglomerates 
which the state backs up in external markets. As I see it, 
Putin wants to channel the natural aggressiveness of the big 
business from inside the country to outside the country, from 
the domestic politics to the global markets. 

Question: How viable is the Kasyanov Cabinet?
Answer: I am not impressed by it en toto. But we will see 
when Putin sends them into combat. 

Question: You have said: "If somebody feels the acute need 
to stand in opposition to Putin, he is certainly welcome to 
become one." Under what conditions do you see the need to have 
such an opponent arising?
Answer: My viewpoint is a bit extremist here. I am 
positive that Putin's political program, which boils down to 
building a compact state and its withdrawal from whatever zone 
it is inefficient in and, hence, doing away with those 
businesses which have emerged in these zones, is incompatible 
with the interests of the political market's masters. I refer 
to the system of shadow authorities in the capital and the 
provinces as the No. 2 State: in some respects, it is not 
unlike the Soviet state and as centralized. 
These groups cannot afford to let Putin do whatever he 
wants to do. The question is who will have the upper hand - 
Putin or them? Putin's current onslaught is a psychological 
attack, with no stealth or political backing. 
A counter-attack will come tomorrow. Putin will be opposed 
by shadow propaganda facilities, i.e. the electronic media 
business. Television would first show a new soap opera, 
entitled "New Opposition." And then there would be an 
organizational basis built and the world public opinion duly 
conditioned. 

Question: Unless the president takes all TV channels under 
control?
Answer: How is he going to do that? Send a battalion of 
bureaucrats to Ostankino? Television and officialdom are 
incompatible. One cannot fill the airtime with hosannas - 
people would stop watching TV newscasts...
There would be attempts to check Putin by the end of the 
year. I do not know about the shape the coalition in opposition 
to the president would take. But external forces would 
certainly be one of its props. For from the viewpoint of the 
global power plays, making life difficult for Putin may pay. 

Question: The way you picture it, it is easy to explain 
away any criticism of Putin by perfidious deeds of oligarchs 
and external forces... The president himself loves to speak of 
"subversive elements"... Your vision?
Answer: There are realistic threats and there are threats 
thought up by his staffs. Also, Putin's ascension has stirred 
up a lot of rubble of all sorts who just love to control, allow 
or ban something...

Question: Do you think Putin would have become the 
president if it were not for the acts of terrorism and the 
subsequent operation in Chechnya?
Answer: If Yeltsin had any doubts about Putin, he would 
not have made him the premier. Yeltsin launched the last stage 
of his project last August 9: the successor runs for election 
and wins. 

Question: This may be true, but Putin's rating would not 
have soared as it did without Chechnya... Your opinion?
Answer: Putin's rating was expected to grow but not as 
steeply, of course.

Question: How do you mean?
Answer: In the beginning, he had the advantage of being 
the premier. Even if a newly appointed premier does well nigh 
nothing, he gets up to 15% of the president's rating in 8-12 
weeks. It goes without saying that it was known from the very 
beginning: Yeltsin would allow Putin to do what nobody else had 
been allowed to do - delve into the foreign policy and 
coordinate the "power structures"... We have had the model of 
Primakov to carefully study. Yes, we opposed him, but we never 
let go out of sight his momentous basis - the mighty 
potentiality of the mass expectation of a new state leader to 
come, the one to replace Yeltsin, to stop the war of the elites 
and to alleviate the fear of the future. 
The election campaign would have been different without 
Chechnya, but Putin would have won in it anyway. In effect, 
Putin dealt with more campaign objectives that had been planned 
by Campaign 2000 planners. 

Question: Don't you think that Chechnya, which had 
elevated Putin's rating sky-high, may turn it down, too?
Answer: No. In a state, the solution of more important 
state problems always overshadows politically other important 
problems.
Example: the war in the Caucasus in the second third of the 
19th century was awfully important for Russia's society, but it 
soon undertook the land reform and lost interest in the 
Caucasus.
People cannot but get distracted...

Question: Can one expect Putin to make decisive moves?
Answer: Yes. This year will either be the year of his 
decisive moves or the year of his majority's disintegration. 

Question: Do you think you will feel comfortable next year?
Do you expect new customers to come to you?
Answer: I am moving to another sphere. Funny as it may 
sound, I have an interest in reorganizing the intellectual 
process in Russia. We are losing in a more important field - in 
the world.
Transcript by Yekaterina DEYEVA and Mikhail ROSTOVSKY.

******


#13
DAILY YOMIURI (Japan)
9 June 2000
[for personal use only]
CENTRAL ASIA'S PANDORA'S BOX
Georgy Kunadze Special to The Daily Yomiuri 
(Kunadze is a former Russian ambassador to South Korea and chief researcher
at the Russian Academy of Sciences' Institute of World Economy and
International Relations.) 


Back in 1992, Central Asian nations gained independence that they neither
intended nor prepared for. The outside world wished them well, but showed
little interest in helping them through the transition. 


Russia, looking west and feeling relieved of what it had gradually come to
perceive as a burden, stopped just short of adopting a hands-off policy.
Suddenly on their own, Central Asian nations embarked on their separate
never-trodden paths to statehood. 


Eight years later they still find themselves at the crossroads, by and
large resigned to their present, uncertain of their future, feeling
insecure and vulnerable. Few old problems have been settled, while many new
problems have emerged. 


Having recently visited Central Asia as a member of a team of consultants
on assignment from a Brussels-based nongovernmental organization, the
International Crisis Group, I will briefly comment on the situation in
Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan. I will leave out Kazakhstan, which
is not exactly a Central Asian country, and Turkmenistan, the land of the
illustrious Turkmen-bashi (father of all Turkmens), which as a potential
trouble spot in its own right deserves separate coverage. 


In Tajikistan, a civil war that broke out in 1992 ended in 1997 with a
death toll of 50,000 to 100,000 people--the margin of error speaks for
itself. The peace agreement between the government and the opposition
stipulated that the forces of both sides be merged. Officially this is
exactly what happened, leaving the U.N. military observers with nothing to
observe. 


In reality, however, the opposition units have been not disbanded, but
legalized as part of the government army. They have retained their old
chain of command and apparent loyalty to their political leaders, who have
been admitted to the government. 


As long as the leaders of the United Tajik Opposition remain in the
government, there is a modus vivendi and a shaky stability. However, the
moment they leave the government, both will be in jeopardy. Furthermore,
the peace agreement is in essence an agreement about profit sharing. In
short, all important field commanders of both sides have been given their
share of property, or influential positions to earn a living. 


But with industry and agriculture at a virtual standstill, the government
often has to turn a blind eye to the fact that at least some of the
strongmen make ends meet in a less than responsible way, by taking a
percentage from black marketeering, gambling or drug trafficking. 


It almost looks as if there is a tacit agreement between the president and
other field commanders. As long as the president lets his friends and
former foes get rich, they do not mind accepting his leadership and even
helping him to get 98 percent of the votes in the recent presidential
election. 


Finally, Tajikistan, to put it mildly, is not blessed with benevolent
neighbors. Afghanistan to the south is in permanent turmoil, which can
spill over the border at any time. Until 1997 it served as a base for the
Tajik opposition forces. Now its specialty is opium production. A map of
Tajikistan, supplied by the U.N. drug control and crime prevention office,
bristles with numerous routes of opium and heroin trafficking that
originate in Afghanistan. 


As for Uzbekistan, it has always been wary and occasionally paranoid about
criminal, religious and ultimately political threats that may emanate from
Tajikistan. Uzbekistan is not above playing big brother to Tajikistan,
which understandably makes the latter feel bitter and humiliated. 


In these not entirely encouraging conditions, a Russian military presence
remains a key element of stability and political balance both inside
Tajikistan and on its borders. Morale and combat readiness of the Russian
servicemen, in both the army and border-troop units are high. So is their
social status in the host country. 


However their mandate apparently lacks sufficient clarity to cover all
contingencies. Also, their combined strength of 20,000 men may not be
enough to cope with a big emergency. Having witnessed the devastating
effects of a civil war in Tajikistan, which started ostensibly as a quest
for democracy and religious freedom, Uzbekistan wants to avoid one at home. 


Uzbekistan no longer pretends to be a democracy. Instead it has opted for
stability, and stability is what it got. However, this is a very special
kind of stability, ensured through an amazingly rigid control over society,
personally exercised by the president himself. Extreme authoritarianism is
the name of the game. Apparently, Uzbekistan draws inspiration from such
countries as South Korea or Singapore, which have followed similar paths
with remarkable success. 


The problem with Uzbekistan is not that its political system does not fully
conform to Western expectations. Rather, it is the lack of commensurate
economic success. As long as enforced stability fails to deliver social and
economic benefits, its political costs tend to grow. 


Tighter control over society and ultimately external foes to help justify
restrictions are needed by the state. This is in fact a classic pattern
that plagued the former Soviet Union. It is perhaps not a coincidence,
therefore, that Uzbekistan bears an ever-growing resemblance to the Soviet
Union when it bans domestic dissent, chases after alleged Muslim
fundamentalists and, on occasion, anyone with a beard. The country also
gets tough with its weaker neighbors from time to time. 


While there is plainly too much control in Uzbekistan, there is too little
of it in Kyrgyzstan, by far the most liberal and therefore likeable country
in Central Asia. Alas, its economic performance remains as unimpressive as
that of its neighbors. Levels of deprivation are high; living standards are
low. There is also an implicit public discontent with the way the
government handles urgent economic and political issues. 


The good news about Kyrgyzstan is that the people no longer fear their
government. The bad news is that they do not seem to respect it either.
Life goes on as if out of habit. But social apathy can be misleading. It
can pose as stability, while being in fact a breeding ground for violent
protest. Under these circumstances, one may wonder whether the Kyrgyz
government can eventually become efficient enough to sustain democracy
without risking stability. 


Unsettling signs of arbitrary rule have already appeared. The government
finally jailed the president's main political rival, lest he should run in
the forthcoming presidential election. He is expected to be acquitted and
released when the election is over. 


Kyrgyzstan is also experiencing problems in its relations with Uzbekistan.
One of the most disquieting among then is that of the cross-border water
supplies. Having turned 30 percent of its cultivated land from cotton to
grain production, Uzbekistan now needs even more water for irrigation from
the Kyrgyz mountain reservoirs. But since the Uzbek natural gas supplies to
Kyrgyzstan have been reduced, the latter has had to rely increasingly on
hydroelectric power generation, leaving it less water to offer Uzbekistan
for irrigation. 


Simple and intractable. This is the way it usually is in Central Asia. 


On top of that there are more than 1,500 disputed areas on the
1000-kilometer-long border between Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan. Grassroots
conflicts routinely occur on the border, further fueling mutually hostile
emotions and aggravating tensions. 


Given the proverbial patience of Central Asians, as well as their centuries
old tradition of paternalism, the chances are that with some luck the
problems described above will stay dormant for the time being. However, if
things deteriorate, every problem has the potential to spark off either a
domestic crisis in any one Central Asian state or a full-scale interstate
conflict. 


The consequences of such a development are hard to predict yet too grave to
ignore. Ultimately, responsibility for preventing the worst-case scenario
lies with the Central Asian governments themselves. But the international
community may also need less conventional and more imaginative new ways of
politically encouraging and economically motivating them to come up with a
coherent strategy of national and regional rehabilitation. 


******

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