Russia Archive

On Dec. 10, the mediators responsible for managing the U.N.-supervised negotiations over Kosovo’s final status reported to the U.N. Security Council that they had failed to overcome the differences separating the Serbian government and Kosovo’s ethnic Albanian majority. “Neither party was willing to cede its position on the fundamental question of sovereignty over Kosovo,” the mediators reported. Kosovo’s political leaders then announced they would declare independence in early 2008 even without the approval of the United Nations or the Serbian government, which is prepared to offer its nominal province substantial autonomy but not independence. At the end of the Dec. […]

Vladimir Putin this week received an additional boost of support from an unlikely source: Time magazine’s editorial board. After the Russian president beat out former Vice President Al Gore and “Harry Potter” author J.K. Rowling for the title of the magazine’s “person of the year,” a firestorm erupted in Russia over the meaning and possible ramifications of the title. “He’s not a good guy, but he’s done extraordinary things,” Time Managing Editor Richard Stengel said on NBC’s “Today” show. “At significant cost to the principles and ideas that free nations prize, [Putin] has performed an extraordinary feat of leadership in […]

On Dec. 13-14, Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Belarusian counterpart, Alexander Lukashenko, attended a conference on the potential union of Belarus and Russia in the Belarusian capital, Minsk. While such conventions have been held periodically since Russia and Belarus formed a loose political union in early 1996, this year’s gathering has attracted special attention. On Dec. 6, Russia’s independent Ekho Moskvy radio station announced that the two presidents would meet in Minsk to sign a constitutional act formalizing the union between their countries. The Union would reportedly involve a common legislature, currency, and military. It is expected that referendums […]

Last week, Moscow violated the Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE) Treaty by failing to provide NATO countries with information about Russian military forces in Europe. Russian diplomats said they had only “suspended” their participation in the treaty regime and were prepared to resume exchanging data as soon as NATO governments met certain Russian demands regarding the agreement. Although the long-term implications of Russia’s CFE moratorium remain unclear, they are clearly worrisome. In the worst case, Moscow could disengage from other arms control agreements that have underpinned European security since the Cold War. The original CFE Treaty is a complex instrument […]

A series of recent studies have warned that climate change could exacerbate north-south tensions, increase global migration, spur public health problems, heighten conflict over resources, challenge the institutions of global governance, and possibly shift the balance of power. Although the probability, extent, and urgency of such threats remains uncertain, U.S. policy makers should prudently hedge against them. Developing a range of tools to mitigate and address climate change is essential given the possible advent of at least some of these challenges. Many Western leaders have made clear that they already perceive serious challenges to their national security from these consequences. […]

It’s not easy being a dictator any more. Once upon a time, you could just hop on a tank, line up some well-armed supporters, and fire a few shots at the presidential palace. The previous resident would move out, alive or otherwise, and voilá: You had yourself a country. All it took after that was a pledge of hatred for Washington or Moscow and automatically the un-hated superpower would start writing checks and sending arms. The country was yours until the next guy hopped on a tank. It’s not so easy any more. These days, the pesky idea of democracy […]

The dispute over international monitoring of Russia’s recent parliamentary and upcoming presidential elections — underscored by President Vladimir Putin’s denunciations against foreign interference in Russia’s parliamentary elections — must be understood as a broader divergence in how Moscow and other member governments envisage the future of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), the world’s largest regional security institution. In particular, Russia and its allies want to rebalance OSCE both functionally and geographically. They seek to reduce the OSCE’s democracy promotion efforts while increasing its role in countering transnational security threats like terrorism and in advancing economic development […]

This past Sunday, Russians went to the polls to vote in national parliamentary elections. The result was hardly in doubt — the United Russia Party of Russia’s President Vladimir Putin swept to victory. Equally predictable was the reaction of most Western media to this largely foreordained result. We are told that Putin is reviving the Soviet Union and that he has been busy building a cult of personality while crushing all political opposition. More importantly, we are told that Putin is reigniting the Cold War rivalry between Russia and the United States. This is the message that we constantly read […]

The victory of Putin’s party in Sunday’s elections for the Duma, the lower house of Russia’s parliament, was widely expected, and the results did not disappoint. According to the preliminary tally, the governing United Russia Party, whose list of candidates was headed by Putin himself, received almost two-thirds of the vote. In alliance with the two other pro-Kremlin parties (the Liberal Democratic Party and the Just Russia Party) that gained sufficient shares of the vote (7 percent) to receive national representation, the pro-Putin bloc will control an overwhelming majority in the Duma. Only the Communists, which won 11-12 percent of […]