RADIO FREE EUROPE/RADIO LIBERTY, PRAGUE, CZECH REPUBLIC
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RFE/RL Russian Political Weekly
Vol. 4, No. 37, 24 September 2004
A Weekly Review of News and Analysis of Russian Domestic Politics
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HEADLINES
* THE END OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION?
* WILL PUTIN’S LATEST ‘REFORM’ FURTHER
DESTABILIZE RUSSIA?
* RUSSIAN NGOS SLAM PUTIN REFORMS AS
‘UNCONSTITUTIONAL’
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PAN-REGIONAL ISSUES
THE END OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION?
By Robert Coalson
The comments of World Bank President James Wolfensohn in “The
Wall Street Journal” on 21 September stood out among the chorus of
voices in Russia and abroad that have criticized President Vladimir
Putin for allegedly using the pretext of the latest wave of terrorist
attacks to strengthen an authoritarian regime.
“I personally would be reluctant to conclude that
[Putin’s] motives are bad,” Wolfensohn said. “I think Russia is a
pretty difficult place to run, and so I wouldn’t come to that
conclusion too quickly.”
“I think that Putin has a very difficult issue to face,” he
added. “The act of barbarism [in Beslan] has upset the entire
country, and the first reaction is for security and trying to
centralize it.”
Other analysts have not been so sanguine, noting that
Putin’s proposals to abolish single-mandate-district
representation in the Duma and to end the direct election of regional
governors were developed by the administration months before the 3
September conclusion of the tragic hostage crisis in Beslan, North
Ossetia, and have little direct relationship to the problem of
terrorism. RFE/RL’s Russian Service on 15 September reported that
an unnamed administration official admitted that the proposals had
been developed long ago and that Beslan merely created an appropriate
political atmosphere for bringing them forward.
“Who would have thought they would use the blood of innocent
children to bring out of the drawers of their Kremlin desks some old
projects and on that blood continue to build up Putin’s
authoritarian regime?” independent Duma Deputy Vladimir Ryzhkov was
cited by RFE/RL as saying.
A number of well-connected political analysts and observers
have predicted that Putin’s innovations will not end with the
proposals already put forward. Many have speculated that the Kremlin
will use the momentum created by Beslan to advance another project
that has been dear to the Kremlin’s collective heart: the
reduction in the number of subjects of the Russian Federation.
“A federal structure is a headache for any central
authority,” former acting Prime Minister Yegor Gaidar wrote in
“Nezavisimaya gazeta” on 17 September. “It is much simpler — I can
say this as someone who was once the head of government — to govern
a unitary state.”
Yelena Babich, head of the St. Petersburg regional branch of
the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR), told zaks.ru on 20
September that Putin’s first two proposals coincide perfectly
with the LDPR’s longstanding political platform. “The LDPR always
advocated party-list voting [for the Duma] and the appointment of
governors,” Babich said. “The next step for the president must be the
enlargement of the regions. I hope that in the end we arrive at a
unitary state, since federalism is killing Russia.” In December 2002,
LDPR leader Vladimir Zhirinovskii said that Russia should have about
30 provinces with populations of not less than 10 million people and
that they should not have their own constitutions.
Other politicians have echoed this sentiment, particularly
those governors who hope to see their stay in power extended as a
result of Putin’s initiative. Significantly, only three of
Russia’s 89 regional leaders have come out against the
president’s proposal to end the direct election of governors.
Kamchatka Oblast Governor Mikhail Mashkovtsev said on 15 September
that “Russia can only be a great power as a unitary state,” Regnum
reported.
Political scientist and Moscow State Institute of
International Relations (MGIMO) professor Andronik Migranyan told
RFE/RL on 15 September that historically Russia has never been a
federation and that “central Russia has always been centralized and
unitary.” He attributed the collapse of the Soviet Union to a
weakening of central power, acerbated by ethnic conflicts in
Nagorno-Karabakh, Transdniester, and other regions. “If we cannot
cope with radical Islam, with terrorism and this playing the ethnic
card in the Caucasus, there is a threat that it might move to
Tatarstan, to Bashkortostan, and so on, stopping everywhere,”
Migranyan argued.
He urged the “radical leveling” of the federation subjects,
particularly the elimination of the “significantly greater
possibilities” enjoyed by the presidents of the republics in the
federation. “There is an imbalance,” Migranyan said. “A subject with
a million people has fewer possibilities than a national-state
formation with a population of just 200,000-300,000.” Next, Migranyan
said, the government should consider the “liquidation of the
national-territorial and national-state formations, the reformation
of the entire state.” “Eighty-nine [federation] subjects is very
ineffective,” he said, adding that the country should be divided into
regions on the principle of “economic efficiency.”
National Strategy Institute Director Stanislav Belkovskii,
who is believed to have close connections within the presidential
administration but who has been critical of Putin’s reform
proposals since Beslan, told “Nezavisimaya gazeta” on 20 September
that the elimination of the ethnic-based state structures will be the
next stage of Putin’s reform. “An attempt will be made to
equalize the rights of the ethnic republics and all the other
regions, with the aim of fully standardizing the ethnic landscape
from a legal, cultural, and semantic point of view,” Belkovskii said.
“Small ethnic territorial formations will be absorbed by larger
components.”
“Rossiiskaya gazeta” columnist and respected journalist
Vitalii Tretyakov wrote in his column on 17 September that although
“many think that a unitary state formed under the current conditions
is much preferable for Russia, including for the so-called national
regions,” he wonders whether “many people think that within those
regions themselves.” However, he said that maintaining the
“appearance of federalism” while having regional leaders appointed by
the center will be “extremely difficult.” He also said that
Putin’s proposal that the heads of the republics in the
federation continue to be directly elected will also create a
“dangerous asymmetry” if it means that those leaders will have
“greater legitimacy” than the Moscow-appointed heads of the other
federation subjects.
Ryzhkov also doubts that many people within the so-called
ethnic republics would welcome the elimination of those structures,
noting that they were formed as a way of giving some autonomy — or
at least the appearance of autonomy — to certain ethnic groups in
keeping with Russia’s self-declared status as a multiethnic
state. “Fortunately, the president has not yet touched the ethnic
republics (in particular Tatarstan and Bashkortostan),” Ryzhkov told
“Nezavisimaya gazeta” on 20 September. “Because any attempt to
eliminate them will spread terrorism far beyond the North Caucasus.”
Speaking to RFE/RL’s Russian Service on 15 September,
Ryzhkov emphasized the potential danger in destabilizing the country
in this way. “Thank God that [Putin] did no more than undermine state
institutions like regional government, the legislature, and so on,”
Ryzhkov said. “If he had gone further, if now he used this storm to
arrange the rewriting of administrative borders, the liquidation of
the republics, then the terrorists would undoubtedly find thousands
of supporters in Tatarstan, including ideological supporters, since
the radical intelligentsia would certainly be in opposition. And then
this could really spread along the Volga and into other regions.”
KREMLIN/WHITE HOUSE
WILL PUTIN’S LATEST ‘REFORM’ FURTHER DESTABILIZE RUSSIA?
By Julie A. Corwin
In an interview with RFE/RL’s Russian Service on 16
September, independent State Duma Deputy Vladimir Ryzhkov suggested
that Russian President Vladimir Putin’s proposal on 13 September
to overhaul regional-level elections could work at cross purposes
with his desire to strengthen the state in response to the recent
wave of terrorism.
Ryzhkov told RFE/RL’s Mikhail Sokolov that the
president’s announcement offered little in the way of specific
measures to combat terrorism, but was very specific with regard to
reforms of Russia’s election system. However, these measures
appear to have little to do with fighting terrorism.
Ryzhkov noted that the idea of appointing governors had been
floating around the Kremlin for many years before the hostage crisis
in Beslan, but the president has been able to use the recent tragedy
to complete political tasks that he has been working on for many
years. “How does the liquidation of the single-mandate district in
Kamchatka Oblast help us to deal with [Chechen President Aslan]
Maskhadov? It’s absolutely incomprehensible.”
Ryzhkov asserted that the president is introducing even more
weakness and instability into the state structure: “The ranks of the
federal government were already demoralized and destabilized because
the orders reorganizing it that were issued in March haven’t yet
been formalized. Now Putin has destabilized the regional elites with
a proposal on appointing the governments, essentially making them all
‘lame ducks.’ They are destabilized and demoralized not for a
short while, [but] for the next few years, as this new initiative is
transformed into legislation, approved, and then implemented.
Likewise, the corps of mayors is also destabilized because Putin
implied that they, too, might soon be appointed rather than elected.
Half of the State Duma is demoralized because their status is now
uncertain despite the fact that they were elected,” he continued.
“Putin has managed to deprive himself of almost all of his
potential allies. Moreover, he is attacking his own people, since
almost all the governors already supported him. The single-mandate
deputies already supported him. He has disorganized almost all
government institutions for the medium short-term, while at the same
time he is calling for mobilization and order,” Ryzhkov added.
In “Moskovskie novosti,” no. 35, other Russian politicians
recently joined Ryzhkov in criticizing Putin’s proposed
initiatives. Former Russian President Boris Yeltsin said that he
hopes that “the measures that the country’s leadership undertakes
after Beslan will remain within the framework of democratic freedoms
that have become Russia’s most valuable achievement over the past
decade. We will not give up on the letter of the law and, most
importantly, the spirit of the constitution our country voted for in
the national referendum in 1993.” In the same issue, former Soviet
President Mikhail Gorbachev commented: “Our common goal is to do
everything possible to make sure that these initiatives, which, in
essence, mean a step back from democracy, don’t come into force
as law.” “I hope that politicians, voters, and the president himself
keep the democratic freedoms that were so hard to obtain.”
CIVIL SOCIETY
RUSSIAN NGOS SLAM PUTIN REFORMS AS ‘UNCONSTITUTIONAL’
By Catherine A. Fitzpatrick
Russians polled immediately after the horrifying terrorist
attack in Beslan, where at least 335 people were killed, half of them
children, were evenly divided as to whether they would cede more
powers to security forces and accept limitations on their own civil
rights and liberties for the sake of preventing terrorism. In a
survey of 500 people conducted by the Levada Analytical Center in
Moscow on 7-8 September, 46 percent said they would definitely give
up their rights, and 45 percent said they would not, with 9 percent
undecided.
It is less likely that President Vladimir Putin’s
proposed reforms of the electoral system, which came in the wake of
the latest series of terrorist attacks and are purportedly designed
to enable the government to fight terrorism better, have the support
of the majority of the public. They have provoked strong protest from
human rights groups and opposition parties now out of parliament, as
well as various commentators in the independent media, all of whom
have already been under attack by the Kremlin in the last year as
Putin has consolidated power. While such outspoken groups are a
minority of voices, they do reflect the concerns of thousands of
nongovernmental groups active on human rights, environmental, and
social issues that have increasingly been expressing concern about
government interference and restrictions on their work. They do not
see the link between curbing democracy and stopping terrorism.
“Terrorism should not be fought by strengthening
authoritarianism, but by cleaning up and reforming law-enforcement
agencies, raising the professionalism of the special services, and
above all, resolving the problems provoking tension in the country,”
the human rights NGO Krasnoyarsk Memorial Society said in a public
statement released on 14 September.
Ludmila Alekseeva, head of the Moscow Helsinki Group, which
is among the oldest human rights groups dating from the Soviet era,
has been a long-standing critic of Putin’s policies, although she
has kept open the door to dialogue with the government, such as at a
national Civic Forum organized by the Kremlin in November 2001. Now
she says that in the name of fighting terrorism, the government is
dismantling the democracy established after the fall of the Soviet
Union.
“The appointment of governors is a completely
unconstitutional assault on electoral law. Our constitution provides
for direct elections, and not indirect, through legislators,”
Alekseeva wrote in an essay on the human rights portal hro.org
published on 15 September. The amendment to the constitution can only
be made because the pro-presidential parties are in a majority in
parliament, according to Alekseeva, who believes that Putin’s
reforms now signify the final subordination of regional authority to
the federal center. “This kills the very point of a federation,” she
said. “The regions should elect people themselves who are popular in
their areas.”
Alekseeva believes that subordinating regional leaders to the
Kremlin’s rule will make Russia less safe, not increase security.
She points to the popular figure of Ruslan Aushev, former president
of Ingushetia, who played a crucial role in the Beslan hostage
crisis, initially securing the release of 26 hostages before he was
removed from negotiations by federal authorities. Earlier, Aushev had
been forced to step down and was replaced by a Kremlin-appointed
leader. “While Ruslan Aushev was in Ingushetia, even if he was
defiant, even if he was inconvenient to Moscow, while he was there,
there weren’t the kind of bandit raids that there are now with
[current President Murat] Zyazikov, appointed from above,” Alekseeva
commented.
Yabloko, a liberal democratic party led by Grigorii
Yavlinskii that lost its seats in parliament in the last election,
roundly criticized Putin’s recent measures. In a statement
released to the media on 13 September, Yabloko said that instead of
cleaning up the security services, the government was eliminating the
last vestiges of public oversight of such agencies. Abolishing local
elections “could lead to the growth of interethnic tension in the
national republics,” said the statement. Not only would the reforms
strike a blow against the foundations of Russian federalism
established since the breakup of the Soviet Union, they would signify
“a return to the extremely ineffective unitary system of government,
which had no feedback from society,” Yabloko stated. “The
president’s initiative is offensive to the citizens of Russia
because it takes away their right to choose their government.”
Most of those criticizing Putin’s moves were already
warning about his restrictions on democracy long before the
August-September wave of terrorism. Their warnings had increased in
the last year, as the Kremlin turned its attention from the
parliament and the media, already brought to heel, to the thousands
of NGOs that have become active in recent years, some with
significant foreign funding. “Russia today is not democratic. It does
not intend, in the presence of its leadership, to become democratic,”
Yelena Bonner, a veteran human rights campaigner, told an audience at
the National Endowment of Democracy on 10 June.
In his state of the nation address in March, President Putin
lashed out at some NGOs, saying they were merely out to profit from
questionable foreign grants, and that human rights activity was not
relevant and not defending the people’s “real interests.” Putin
claimed some groups were agents of influence from foreign
foundations, or were serving “dubious groups and commercial
interests.” The extraordinary attack was followed by months of
articles placed in pro-government newspapers and various
propagandistic interventions at public meetings and abroad attacking
the human rights movement as “unconstructive.”
Soon after Putin’s March speech, the Tatarstan Human
Rights Center in Kazan was raided by masked men who smashed computers
and other equipment. The attack came hours after the group accused
local police of pressuring them for their criticism. The group was
funded by Open Russia, a foundation funded by jailed oil tycoon
Mikhail Khodorkovskii.
The pro-government parliament picked up on the Kremlin’s
new harsh attitude toward activist groups by considering draft
legislation to further control NGO activity, already under
considerable regulation in Russian. The draft law envisions a
commission to control funding for NGOs, and all foreign or domestic
donors will have to clear registration and reporting hurdles, in
addition to regular tax returns. Contributions not approved by this
commission could be taxed at the rate of 24 percent.
NGOs working in Russia’s major areas of unrest were
already feeling the pinch of new restrictive policies long before the
current wave of terror. The Foreign Ministry spokesman told
reporters, for example, that NGOs in Chechnya “are predominantly
engaged in collecting information, not in providing real humanitarian
aid,” “The Washington Post” reported 31 May. Kremlin consultant Gleb
Pavlovskii accused groups that receive international funding of a
“conflict of interest” because they embraced foreign notions of human
rights, the daily reported.
Despite the most concerted attack on human rights NGOs since
the Soviet era, the sheer numbers and achievements of such groups has
meant their movement still has momentum. This week, a civil rights
lawyer, Karina Moskalenko, was able to win an appeal to the Supreme
Court to overturn an order by the Krasnodar Krai Justice Ministry to
disband the Krasnodar Krai Human Rights Center. The group had been
accused of various legal violations and they were able to convince
the judge that the allegations were untrue.
Yet, groups more directly related to the Chechen conflict
face far greater scrutiny and even legal action. The Chechen
Committee of National Salvation is to face hearings at the end of
September that could result in closure under new legislation tagged
“On Countering Extremist Activities,” the New York-based lawyers
organization Human Rights First reported 22 September. The Chechen
group is not known to have used or advocated violence and has been
deregistered in the past due to its human rights work in the region.
Human Rights First fears that in the name of cracking down on
terrorism, the government will also intimidate human rights monitors.
Such monitors have already proved invaluable in exposing official
corruption and misrule, the kind of factors that President Putin
himself said played a role in the recent failure to prevent and
respond to terrorism.
TERROR IN RUSSIA
PUTIN’S ‘MANAGED’ INVESTIGATION INTO BESLAN
By Robert Coalson
Can Putin’s commission provide any answers as to what
happened in Beslan?
Shortly after the 3 September conclusion of the tragic school
hostage taking in Beslan, North Ossetia, President Vladimir Putin
said that there would be no public investigation into the incident.
Speaking to Western journalists and academics on 6 September, Putin
said that he would conduct an internal probe into the matter. He
added that if the Duma looked into it, the investigation would become
“a political show” and “would not be very effective,” “The Guardian”
reported the next day.
A few days later, however, a “political show” of a different
sort got under way, Kremlin critics say. Putin held a televised
meeting on 10 September with Federation Council Chairman Sergei
Mironov, in which the latter informed him that the Federal Assembly
intended to create an interparliamentary commission to probe the
affair. Such televised meetings have become a prominent feature of
Putin’s post-Beslan management style: on 14 September, for
instance, he held a stage-managed meeting with Prime Minister Mikhail
Fradkov in which the prime minister “informed” him that Gazprom
should be allowed to purchase state oil company Rosneft.
As the cameras rolled, Putin told Mironov on 10 September
that “we are all interested in getting a complete and objective
picture of the tragic events,” Russian media reported. Putin further
said he would order all executive-branch agencies to cooperate with
the legislature’s investigation. Although Putin’s apparent
volte-face might have been prompted by the negative reaction in
Russia and the West to his statement rejecting an independent
inquiry, no one expected that the meeting with Mironov signaled a
real change of heart or strategy.
On 20 September, the Federation Council held a closed-door
session during which the composition of the investigating commission
was determined. A few days earlier, council Deputy Chairman Aleksandr
Torshin told RIA-Novosti that the commission’s schedule had
largely been determined, even though its membership had not been
named. Torshin emphasized that the legislation governing such
commissions is incomplete and that the commission would have no
authority to compel senior officials to testify. He added, though,
that it might even ask Putin himself to answer questions.
During its 20 September meeting, the Federation Council
decided that the commission would comprise 11 council members and 10
Duma deputies and would be headed by Torshin. The 11 council members
are: Torshin, Defense and Security Committee member Aleksei
Aleksandrov, Constitutional Law Committee Deputy Chairman Leonid
Bindar, Industry Committee Deputy Chairman Erik Bugulov, Economy
Committee First Deputy Chairman Vladimir Gusev, Legal and Judicial
Affairs Committee member Rudik Iskuzhin, Audit Chamber Cooperation
Commission Deputy Chairman Yurii Kovalev, Federation Council Affairs
Commission Chairman Vladimir Kulakov, CIS Affairs Committee member
Oleg Panteleev, Defense Committee Deputy Chairman Vyacheslav Popov,
and Constitutional Law Committee Chairman Valerii Fedorov.
The 10 Duma members are expected to be named on 25 September.
Seven will represent Unified Russia, with one each from the Communist
Party, Motherland, and the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia.
“Vremya novostei” and “Nezavisimaya gazeta” noted on 21 September
that there will most likely be no independent deputies on the
commission, even though independent Deputy Vladimir Ryzhkov was the
first to call for an independent probe.
Mironov told “Vremya novostei” that commission members were
selected in part on the basis of their contacts with the secret
services. “People selected for the commission are ones who have a
high level of access,” Mironov said. The paper predicted that the
Duma representatives would be dominated by Unified Russia loyalists
and former security-service figures — “people who won’t ask
‘unnecessary’ questions.”
At a press conference announcing the commission, Mironov
stressed that it will not conduct a public investigation. “Commission
members will not have the right to publicize information about the
progress of the investigation or to comment on it except at official
press conferences sanctioned by the commission chairman,” Mironov
said, according to km.ru and other Russian media. Mironov said the
commission will prepare a final report, but refused to say whether
that report will be made public. “Kommersant-Daily” reported on 21
September that Mironov has also ordered that commission members not
be allowed to discuss the commission’s work without his
permission even after the probe is completed.
The semi-formed commission began work immediately and arrived
on 21 September in North Ossetia to begin five days of collecting
testimony from local witnesses and officials. However, few analysts
expressed confidence that the commission would ever produce
definitive answers to lingering questions about the Beslan events,
including the identities of the hostage takers, the exact numbers of
hostages and victims, what the government’s plans were for either
negotiating with the terrorists or storming the building, and how
former Ingushetian President Ruslan Aushev was able to negotiate with
the hostage takers and to secure the release of 26 of the hostages.
“It will be impossible to have any confidence in this
commission and its conclusions,” Ryzhkov told “Nezavisimaya gazeta”
on 21 September, “because Unified Russia is compromised by the same
authorities who allowed such failures in the North Caucasus and, in
particular, in Beslan.”
COMINGS & GOINGS
IN: Former presidential envoy to the Siberian
Federal District Leonid Drachevskii, who was dismissed by President
Vladimir Putin on 9 September (see “RFE/RL Newsline,” 10 September
2004), is expected to be named deputy CEO of Unified Energy Systems
(EES), “Rossiiskaya gazeta” reported on 17 September, citing EES
manager Andrei Trapeznikov. EES CEO Anatolii Chubais reportedly made
the offer during a 90-minute meeting with Drachevskii on 16 September
and Drachevskii reportedly agreed. Current EES Deputy CEO Yakov
Urinson will remain in his post and Chubais will have two deputies,
Trapeznikov said. An official announcement is expected on 1 October
when the EES board of directors holds its next meeting.
IN: Yevgenii Satanovskii has been reelected as head of
the Russian Jewish Congress, newsru.com reported on 15 September.
POLITICAL CALENDAR
23 September: The heads of government of Shanghai
Cooperation Organization member states will meet in Bishkek
26 September: State Duma will consider draft 2005 budget in
its first reading
26 September: Khabarovsk mayoral election will be held
29 September: Auction for the government’s stake in
LUKoil will be held
October: President Vladimir Putin will visit China
October: International forum of the Organization of the
Islamic Conference will be held in Moscow
1 October: Deadline for population to select a management
company to handle their pension-fund contributions, according to
“Kommersant-Daily” on 3 September
1 October: Date by which the government will decide whether
to sell a controlling stake in Aeroflot, according to Economic
Development and Trade Minister German Gref
4-8 October: Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly will
convene
7 October: President Putin’s 52nd birthday
10 October: Mayoral elections scheduled for Magadan
23-26 October: Second anniversary of the Moscow theater
hostage crisis
25 October: First anniversary of former Yukos head Mikhail
Khodorkovskii’s arrest at an airport in Novosibirsk
31 October: Presidential election in Ukraine
November: Gubernatorial election in Pskov and Kurgan oblasts
14 November: Mayoral election will take place in
Blagoveshchensk
20 November: Sixth anniversary of the killing of State Duma
Deputy Galina Starovoitova
22 November: President Putin to visit Brazil
December: A draft law on toll roads will be submitted to the
government, according to the Federal Highways Agency’s
Construction Department on 6 April
December: Gubernatorial elections in Vladimir, Bryansk,
Kamchatka, Ulyanovsk, and Volgograd oblasts; Khabarovsk Krai; and
Ust-Ordynskii Autonomous Okrug
December: Presidential elections in Marii-El and Khakasia
republics
5 December: By-elections for State Duma seats will be held in
two single-mandate districts in Ulyanovsk and Moscow
5 December: Gubernatorial election will be held in Astrakhan
Oblast
29 December: State Duma’s fall session will come to a
close
1 February 2005: Former President Boris Yeltsin’s 74th
birthday
March 2005: Gubernatorial election in Saratov Oblast.
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Copyright (c) 2004. RFE/RL, Inc. All rights reserved.
The “RFE/RL Russian Political Weekly” is prepared by Julie A. Corwin
on the basis of a variety of sources. It is distributed every
Wednesday.
Direct comments to Julie A. Corwin at [email protected].
For information on reprints, see:
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