Khodorkovsky to stand for election?

August 10, 2005 By

Jailed Yukos boss Mikhail Khodorkovsky has announced that he is considering standing for election to the State Duma in an upcoming by-election.

"I  am absolutely confident that they will not allow me to run. But if I receive  letters from people whose opinions are important for me, I will agree,  even  being  aware of

… Read the rest

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Yeltsin's political comeback

July 28, 2005 By

CXW posts some amusing speculation about who might become Russia’s next President at registan.net and comes up with a surprising candidate – Boris Yeltsin.

WTF?  Well, quoting Sergei Markov in RIA Novosti:

"Oligarchs, who made a pile during Yeltsin’s tenure, dream of revanche. They are in the same boat with

… Read the rest

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Censorship of English language Russian media?

July 14, 2005 By

David McDuff points to what he sees as a trend towards censorship of English language translations of Russian media reports.

With the Kremlin’s increasing stranglehold on the flow of information out of Russia, it’s becoming evident that English-language versions of Russian press reports and commentaries, especially if they come from sources

… Read the rest

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2008 Presidential election – an opening salvo?

July 11, 2005 By

Former Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov is the subject of a criminal investigation over an illegal property purchase.  Kasyanov, who was Prime Minister through almost all of Putin’s first term, has been strongly critical of Putin during this last year, and is perhaps the most credible ‘opposition’ figure to emerge so far as a candidate… Read the rest

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Report on Meeting with President Bush and Civil Society Organizations

May 16, 2005 By

On May 9th, US President George W Bush met with representatives of Russian civil society in Moscow.  One of those representatives was Elena Malitskaya, Preisdent of the Siberian Civic Initiatives Support Center.  Here she presents her first hand report of that meeting, which differs in some respects to accounts given in the US press.… Read the rest

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Putin's State of the Nation address

April 26, 2005 By

President Vladimir Putin presented his annual State of the Nation address yesterday( transcript here).  The content of the address has been somewhat obscured by the rather inflammatory ‘money’ quote:

"Above all, we should acknowledge that the collapse of the Soviet Union was a major geopolitical disaster of the century."

Understandably, this has upset… Read the rest

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Union?

April 11, 2005 By

Following last week’s meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko, many observers – myself included – chose to make fun of the way in which Lukashenko related or, rather, did not relate to Putin’s pet labrador. But perhaps more was agreed at their meeting than we originally thought.. … Read the rest

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Democracy for Belarus

April 7, 2005 By

It’s 3:40am and I can’t sleep.  So, what better to do than read Publius Pundit? 

Belarus is the latest country in Robert’s sights, and this is just a part of what he has to say:

Regardless of Russian assistance, I’m setting at maximum September 2006 the date of Belarus’ revolution, the

… Read the rest

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Russia's muted reaction

March 24, 2005 By

I’ve only been able to find one official comment from Russia about the events in Kyrgyzstan today. From the looks of it, Russia is keeping its mouth more or less shut while it reconciles itself to the changing face of Kyrgyz politics. This is from RIA Novosti:

"In the current situation the appeal

… Read the rest

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Kyrgyzstan protests escalate

March 21, 2005 By

Anti-government protests in the southern Kyrgyz cities of Osh and Jalalabad seem to be spiralling beyond the control of President Askar Akayev and his government today. 

Nathan at registan.net is continuing to do a great job of covering the news and rumours as they come flying out:

As noted

… Read the rest

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Kasparov swaps chess for politics

March 12, 2005 By

Garry Kasparov, probably the greatest chess player in the history of the game, has announced his retirement from professional competition.  He now plans to focus his considerable energies on Russian politics through his involvement in Committee 2008.

Kasparov has dominated global chess for 20 years, first winning the world championship in an epic match with… Read the rest

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Moldovan election aftermath

March 8, 2005 By

Following their defeat in Sunday’s Moldovan parliamentary election, opposition parties have called off their plans to bring people out onto the streets of Chisnau to protest the result.  Instead, they plan to work through parliament to prevent Vladimir Voronin from being re-elected President.

Leaders of both opposition parties said Monday

… Read the rest

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Communists win in Moldova

March 7, 2005 By

Final results are in from Sunday’s Moldovan elections. The Communist Party, as expected, triumphed, but not by as many votes as predicted. Here’s the breakdown of the three parties that forced their way over the five percent threshold and into 101-seat parliament.

  • Communist Party:  46.1% / 56 seats
  • Democratic Moldova Bloc: 28.4% /

… Read the rest

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Moldovan election today

March 6, 2005 By

Moldova’s parliamentary election is today.  Here’s a (very) basic outline for those of you unfamiliar with Moldova.

  • The 101-seat parliament that is elected today will go on to elect the country’s President. 
  • Moldova is currently governed by the Communist Party, which turned its back on Russia a year or so ago in

… Read the rest

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Some more thoughts on the Bush-Putin summit

February 28, 2005 By

Although very few people in the world really know what Presidents George W Bush and Vladimir Putin talked about in their summit, leaks are beginning to trickle out.

I found this one from Time Magazine particularly amusing, largely because of the number of bloggers who should know better (Chrenkoff, Myopic… Read the rest

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Central Asia votes

February 25, 2005 By

Sunday is the big day for elections in Central Asia where voters will be going to the polls in both Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.  Nathan at The Argus is posting daily news roundups – here’s the latest – and he’ll doubtless be analysing the outcome, too.

It seems like there’s plenty of the usual post-Soviet… Read the rest

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Bush's speech – what are the blogs saying?

February 22, 2005 By

Bush’s ‘peacemaking’ tour of Europe began with a speech in which he called for Europe (well, the EU) and America to work together to spread freedom and peace throughout the world.  Several states came in for direct criticism, including Russia.  Below I’ve excerpted the relevant section of his speech, and followed it… Read the rest

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Today even Communists wear orange

February 15, 2005 By

Lyndon at Scraps of Moscow reflects on the role of the Communist Party in Russia today.  It has been the organising force behind many of the recent anti-Putin protests that have swept across the length and breadth of Russia, and is, to all extents and purposes, the only effective opposition party in Russia today:

… Read the rest

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