Gazeta.ru, Kommersant, Gazeta, RBC Daily

Russian society rises from slumber

The March 14 elections in Russia's regions had an unexpected outcome. The pro-Kremlin United Russia party has lost the mayoral election in Irkutsk and won less than 50% of the vote in most of the eight regional parliamentary elections.

The party still considers the outcome a victory, but independent analysts say it has lost the popularity test.

Over 6,000 referendums and elections were held on Sunday in 76 Russian regions. The winner in the mayoral election in Irkutsk, East Siberia, was Viktor Kondrashov, a candidate from the Communist Party. He got almost twice the number of votes compared to United Russia's Sergei Serebrennikov.

The opposition is very active in Irkutsk, first of all, because of the government decision to allow the Baikalsk Pulp and Paper Plant, which discharges its wastewater into Lake Baikal, to resume operation. Prime Minister Vladimir Putin signed the relevant resolution at the start of the election campaign, pushing the problem to the top of the election agenda.

The day before the elections United Russia hoped to win more than 50% of the vote in the eight regional parliamentary elections, so the preliminary results came as a shock. A source in the party's management told the business newspaper Kommersant that the preliminary results indicted "protest voting, when rather than support any single candidate people vote against the present authorities."

Independent analysts say that United Russia has lost the elections.

"Given United Russia's high-strung election campaign, the results are deplorable, less than 50% almost everywhere," Alexander Kynev, director for regional programs at the Foundation for Information Policy Development, a partner of USAID in Russia, told Gazeta.ru.

He said we are seeing a change in the public mood, with society rising from slumber.

The mayoral election in Irkutsk is indicative of this process, Kynev said. "It is not a local instance but a trend, and these results are a loud signal for the elite and other forces that supported United Russia through clenched teeth."

"A time of systemic political change is coming to Russia," Alexander Rahr, director of the Russia/Eurasia Program at the German Council on Foreign Relations, told Gazeta. "United Russia has been put under powerful pressure, including by the president, and will now have to really fight its strengthening rivals."

"As for Dmitry Medvedev and Vladimir Putin, they would benefit from getting a true picture of people's sympathies," Rahr said. "They must see what the people favor - more authoritarian and conservative modernization or more liberal modernization."

Dipkuryer supplement to Nezavisimaya Gazeta

Iranian bomb overshadows Middle East

If Iran obtains nuclear weapons, it will turn the Middle East into a powder keg, just as the Balkans once became Europe's powder keg, writes Oleg Grinevsky, director of the Europe-U.S. Center at the Russian Academy of Sciences' Institute of Europe. Current discussions are therefore increasingly focusing on the possibility of the United States or Israel bombing Iranian nuclear facilities.

The U.S. is unlikely to risk such a move. America's top brass, of course, have plans for a strike against Iran, but this does not mean that the U.S. leadership will use force. Tehran could retaliate by targeting U.S. troops in Afghanistan and Iraq. Iran could also hit oil facilities in Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait. The upshot is that Al Qaeda and the Taliban would triumph, and the war against the U.S. in Iraq and Afghanistan would flare up with renewed vigor. And Washington, which has been waging an unsuccessful campaign there for many years, would have to enter into a third and far more dangerous war in Iran.

Israel is more likely to strike at Iranian nuclear facilities. A nuclear Iran would pose a deadly threat to Israel, which it has threatened to wipe off the face of the earth. Considering the Jewish state's small territory, its population density and hot climate, one or two Hiroshima- or Nagasaki-type atom bombs would be enough. Hamas, Hezbollah and Syria on the Golan Heights would do the rest.

So, in the view of many experts, Israel would find it less dangerous to strike Iranian nuclear facilities to prevent Tehran from developing nuclear weapons than to face a nuclear-armed Iran.

The answer to the question of when such a military operation could take place depends on the time Iran will need to develop full-fledged nuclear weapons.

Amos Yadlin, chief of the Israeli military intelligence, said at the end of 2008 that Iran had the technical knowhow and could assemble a nuclear warhead but was simply taking its time.

Washington's estimates are close to Israel's. Dennis Blair, the U.S. national intelligence director, said on March 10, 2009, that Iran was technically equipped to produce enough highly enriched uranium to make one warhead in 2010-2015.

Russian intelligence keeps silent: its estimates have not yet appeared in the media. But Russian nuclear scientists, interviewed by the author in early 2007, believed Iran was engaged in a nuclear weapons program and could build its own bomb in 2012-2017.

The issue of whether and when Iran will be capable of making an atom bomb has reached a critical point. The international community now needs to decide what to do as a matter of urgency.

Kommersant

Russian invasion scare sweeps Georgia after TV hoax

On Saturday, Georgia's privately owned Imedi television station caused nationwide panic with its mock news report on an alleged Russian "invasion," the "assassination" of President Mikheil Saakashvili and the coming to power of "pro-Moscow forces" headed by opposition leaders Nino Burdzhanadze and Zurab Nogaideli.

At the end of a 30-minute broadcast, the anchor said the events were to take place on June 7, the first day of the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa.

Some people placed emergency calls reporting heart attacks, and others rushed in a panic to buy bread and gasoline.

The opposition and independent analysts are sure the broadcast was ordered by the government, which wanted to prepare voters for the Tbilisi mayoral elections, the main political event of the year, scheduled to be held on May 30.

The Georgian opposition does not conceal its plans to run for the key post of Tbilisi mayor because any mayoral candidate who garners a majority in Tbilisi would be well-placed to parlay that victory into a presidential win in 2013, when Saakashvili is expected to step down.

Opposition parties have already promised to hold a primary and to choose a joint mayoral candidate. That is certain to increase their chances of success.

"This incident will eventually play into the government's hands," said independent political analyst David Avalishvili. "The hysteria will soon subside but many people will remember the incident and will draw similarities if the opposition tries, as usual, to hold protest rallies after May 30 because the 'chronicle of a terrible future' began with protests against the rigging of mayoral elections."

"This has happened each time prior to major political events. In 2006, a terrible provocation was staged during local elections. Russian officers were arrested and relations with Russia hit an all-time low," said Erosi Kitsmarishvili, former Georgian ambassador to Moscow and now a leader of the Maestro opposition TV channel.

"In 2007, a smear campaign was organized against opposition leaders, who were accused of cooperating with the Russian secret services. In 2008, the 'Russian card' was played again in the run-up to parliamentary and presidential elections. Today's hoax is another PR move in the run-up to mayoral elections," Kitsmarishvili told the paper.

Former Imedi channel journalist Georgy Targamadze, leader of Georgia's Christian Democratic Movement, said he was convinced the government was behind the hoax.

"The channel's current editorial policies are completely subordinated to the government. Suffice it to say that Imedi CEO Georgy Arveladze is a former Minister of the Economy and an ex-chief of the Presidential Executive Office," Targamadze said.

"This is directly linked with mayoral elections. The government is trying to aggravate the situation and to show that Russia is trying to interfere in Georgia's domestic politics," he said in conclusion.

Vedomosti

Failing memory of Russian prime minister

Foreign businesses in Russia are subject to the same rules as Russian companies, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said last Friday during an online conference in New Delhi. He said he did not know of a single foreign company that would have lost its investment or been in any way dissatisfied.

One could suppose that important state concerns prevent the Cabinet head from keeping track of every single company operating in Russia. Therefore, Vedomosti has decided to help him by reminding him of a few high-profile stories.

In 2006, Gazprom pushed Shell, Mitsui and Mitsubishi out of a very lucrative gas project in Sakhalin. After Russian environmental watchdog accused Sakhalin Energy, the operator of the Sakhalin 2 project, of breaking Russia's environmental regulations, the foreign companies hit the right solution to the problem and ceded control of the project to the Russian state gas monopoly.

Russian-British oil venture TNK-BP had to agree to sell to Gazprom 62.8% of Rusia Petroleum, which develops the huge Kovykta field, after the Natural Resources Ministry threatened to revoke its license over breaking project deadlines.

The ordeal of Swedish IKEA, which is known for lack of tolerance with regard to corruption of any sort, has led Lennart Dahlgren, IKEA's first country manager for Russia, to write a book in which he describes cases of extortion, the size of bribe one needs to pay to get an appointment with the president and other Russian realities.

Norwegian Telenor is also familiar with Russian ways of doing business, as it nearly lost its investment in Russia's VimpelCom in 2009. Managers of French Total must be still shuddering as they recall the Russian Olympic Committee's claim for 3% of its Russian project returns in exchange for lobbying for it. The committee even asked the prosecution authorities to force Total to build sports facilities worth $70 million.

Putin must have forgotten the ugly story involving Svyazinvest which eventually caused international investor George Soros to leave the Russian market. Last year, media tycoon Rupert Murdoch said he was scared of investing in Russia and decided to divest his Russian assets.

France's largest food retailer Carrefour has recently left Russia, too, citing lack of growth prospects in Russia after the country adopted a new trade law.

The tragedy of lawyer Sergei Magnitsky, who died in prison, must have slipped from Putin's memory as well. Magnitsky worked for the Hermitage Fund, which had invested $4 billion in Russia by 2006. The company accused top Moscow Interior Department officials of taking over firms owned by the fund, which were then used for embezzlement of 5.4 billion rubles from the federal budget.

It is amazing that the prime minister should forget about the law on limiting foreign investors' access to strategic sectors of Russia's economy. The OECD estimated that the law made 52% of Russia's economy inaccessible to foreign investors.

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MOSCOW, March 15 (RIA Novosti)