Kommersant
Cutting NATO’s attack capability
Russia wants to ban the deployment of substantial combat forces in new NATO member states. This is one issue mentioned in Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s draft agreement on the foundations of Russia - NATO relations. Russia’s Deputy Foreign Minister, Sergei Ryabkov, said that signing the agreement will increase the "level of predictability of NATO’s military operations."
Yesterday in Moscow, U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Philip Gordon and U.S. Ambassador to NATO Ivo Daalder held talks with Russian diplomats ahead of the upcoming Russia-NATO summit in Lisbon. NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen’s planned pre-summit visit to Moscow was high on their agenda. Two issues Moscow is keen to see raised during Rasmussen’s visit are: defining the term "substantial combat forces" (SCF) and signing an agreement specifying NATO commitments not to deploy these forces on the territory of former Soviet republics that are now alliance members.
Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said that Russia’s draft agreement limits the temporary deployment of “SCF” in those countries that joined NATO during its last wave of enlargement.
Defining moment
An anonymous source at NATO headquarters confirmed the receipt of the Russian draft agreement and said the main problem is that the term SCF has never been properly defined.
“What is a ‘substantial’ force? A brigade? A division? In our view several hundred or even thousand personnel does not equal a substantial force,” said the source. “If we moved a division from Germany to Poland, this would probably be substantial. We were originally supposed to redeploy forces from other countries as needed rather than station substantial combat forces in new countries. However, we are not imposing any specific restrictions on ourselves, as with the nuclear arsenal. After all, countries have the right to defend themselves.”
Moscow insists upon an agreement in which the term “substantial combat forces” is precisely defined. Russian envoy to NATO Dmitry Rogozin suggested agreeing it refers to brigade-level forces permanently stationed in a state, including temporary deployments of over 42 days per year.
Moscow is anxious to see legally binding commitments stating that Russia and NATO no longer consider each other as adversaries and are not planning offensives. This is stated in the Founding Act on Mutual Relations, Cooperation and Security between the Russian Federation and NATO signed in 1997, and the 2002 Rome Declaration of the Heads of State and Government of the Russian Federation and NATO member states, but these are political, not legal, agreements.
The prospects of signing an agreement of this kind seem slim. Rogozin said that NATO members “do not want to sign anything.” However, the alliance source hinted that talks on this subject are not hopeless. “In relation to Russia – nothing is taboo. If you recall the NATO Secretary General’s recent speech in Rome, he talked about the need for trust-building measures between NATO and Russia. And we are likely to reach specific agreements, but it is too early to talk about it.”
Gazeta.ru
Personalized license plates: Russia’s new revenue stream?
As Russia’s lawmakers move to diversify the economy away from oil, one official strikes upon a potential lucrative vein: personalized license plates.
A bill on official sales of personalized license plates, aimed at abolishing the black market in the goods, has been submitted to the State Duma. Experts doubt it will make any difference.
Cut crime and boost income
It envisages creating a new source of revenue while simultaneously eliminating the graft now rampant in the personalized license plate trade, by putting them up for public auction over the Internet. Regional authorities will organize these e-sales.
Those most likely to interest prospective buyers, as well as those suggested by individuals and corporations, will be put up for sale. All suggestions will have to be agreed with the relevant authorities.
Mikhail Grishankov, first deputy head of the lower house committee on security, who put the bill forward for consideration, told Gazeta.ru that Oleg Chirkunov, Perm Territory governor, is one of the bill’s authors. “He first voiced the idea about a year ago. It has taken us all this time to agree the draft with the traffic police, the Interior Ministry and other agencies,” the deputy said. “Traffic police head Viktor Kiryanov approved the sales early this fall,” he added.
When drafting the bill, all possible ways of getting desirable and easy-to-remember license plates were explored.
“For some it is just sheer luck: they get a desirable license plate simply because they get lucky. Others get them through personal contacts in the Interior Ministry or the State Traffic Inspectorate. And the rest pay for their dream license plates in cash. There is often a link between these last two,” the deputy said.
So, in Grishankov’s view, open auctions will simply decriminalize the current process.
Guaranteed demand
Alexander Kuranchev, general director of the Russian Auction House, does not doubt that personalized license plates will enjoy high demand in Russia. “They will be sought after by a certain type of person who considers them a badge of distinction,” the expert said. “Of course, it is difficult to predict the potential market, but we would readily undertake trial sales.”
As regards the upper price of such plates, it is likely to depend on how much a new car costs. License plates priced at 10,000 euros are unlikely to arouse much interest.”
Viktor Travin, president of the Car Owners Protection Board, agrees.
“In Moscow, plates like these can cost up to 100,000 rubles. That’s the ceiling price. Only when you’re talking about a ‘privileged’ license plate does the price shoot up to $15,000,” he says.
Travin also believes that introducing auctions will do little to diminish the black market in car license plates.
Vremya Novostei
Moscow fudges radical right issue
Should radical right-wing groups be allowed to protest publically, and if so – where? Moscow city hall has to date struggled to find a decisive answer.
Of late Moscow’s solution has been to allow far right groups to protest, but only in the outskirts of the city.
Yesterday’s announcement confirmed this course is set to continue. Unity Day, November 4th, this year will see its fair share of nationalist slogans because the right-wing Russian March has been given the green light.
Like last year, when the rally was held in the South Eastern suburb of Lyublino, nationalists will be free to shout “Russia for the Russians” as loud as they like, so long as they stay well away from the city center.
Nationalist activists seem to have taken the news of this decision in their stride: even trying to see the positive in it.
Extreme protest – on the sidelines
Dmitry Dyomushkin, leader of the banned right-wing group Slavic Union and one of the main Russian March ideologues, told Russian TV that radicals like him even wanted to protest in Lyublino.
“First, social tensions are rife in the district,” he explained “a lot of people who worked at the Cherkizovsky market before it was closed down now work in the Moskva shopping center there. So it’s just the place for us,” he said. “Second – it’s always better to confront people directly rather than just shout into thin air in central Moscow.”
Russian March’s organizers, Slavic Power and the Movement against illegal immigration, expect this year’s event to be just as popular as last year’s which they claim attracted 5,000 people.
Russian March has a wide appeal: from politicized nationalists to football fans (read: hooligans) and disparate right wing groups.
Since 2005 it has been timed to coincide with Russia’s new holiday on November 4th, marking the popular uprising of the 1612 expulsion of Polish invaders from Moscow.
To ban or not to ban?
For the past six years, Moscow city hall has grappled with the issue of whether or not to allow right-wing nationalist groups to hold civilized protests.
While in 2006, Russian March was banned in Moscow, the following year, the city authorities allowed them to march in the city center. Then, in 2008, they were again banned from the heart of the capital, and were violently dispersed by riot police when they attempted to ignore the ban and go ahead with their protest.
Unlike the pro-Kremlin Nashi (Ours) and Young Russia movements, antifascists are not expected to stage any massive demonstrations this year.
One organizer of last year’s Russians Against Fascism protest (also held on November 4), Maxim Solopov, said hard-core nationalist movements no longer posed any major threat, and that attracting additional attention to their event would be pointless.
The antifascists are right to be cautious: practically the entire youth movement is under surveillance by security services following an incident in July when the administration of the town of Khimki (outside Moscow) was targeted by radicals. Many radical leaders have only just been released under strict conditions.
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MOSCOW, October 27 (RIA Novosti)
