Tracing the policy movements of Presidential power-handler Vladislav Surkov is rather like witnessing a three-point turn in a dark alley - as a piece in the Power Vertical points out today.  Whilst transparency is the last thing once can expect from the Kremlin's shadowy ideologue, his moves of late are dizzying analysts.  Brian Whitmore identifies some of Surkov's recent twists - from the motives for his alleged involvement in the Duma walkout - to the matter of his oscillating stance on liberalizing political structures to aid economic development.Whitmore quotes from a Stratfor.com analysis, which suggests that Surkov's maneuvring is underpinned by a familiar motive: power rivalry.  In a recently published four-part series titled "The Kremlin Wars," Stratfor.com offers up one possible answer.According to Stratfor, the Kremlin is divided into two roughly ...

Democracy would be calamitous for Russia: this is the message we are hearing today from chief Kremlin ideologue Vladislav Surkov, via Reuters.  Certainly, we can concur, there's nothing like democracy to wreck a highly tuned and iron wrought power vertical, of which Surkov is seen as a founding father. In a rare interview in Itogi magazine, published yesterday, the Kremlin's media-shy "Grey Cardinal" stepped out of the shadows to rebuff calls for democratic reforms, precipitated by the election results falsification outcry.  Such measures, he argues, would impede economic development and provoke nation-imperiling instability.  The good news is that apparently Russia doesn't need a Pinochet.  Small blessings. "Even now when power is rather consolidated and ordered, ...

Andrew Wilson of the European Council on Foreign Relations has a piece on Transitions Online which takes a look at some opinions of Gleb Pavlovsky and Yevgeny Gontmahker to debate what the Pikalyovo incident did and did not teach us about politics in Russia.Pikalyovo was also an attempt to address the inefficiencies in Putin's authoritarian project by creating what Russians call obratnaya sviaz ("reverse connection"). The system works, but only just. Russia still needs a modernization project, albeit not the "prosperity project," backed by good finances and sound macroeconomics, which the Putin-Medvedev tandem was originally supposed to implement. Not only will Russia have to proceed with fewer resources, it will have to tackle the flip side of a stronger state, what even Pavlovsky calls "severe monopolism in all social spheres," not just in government and the economy, but in the mass media and in society at ...

TODAY: Conflicting voices on air base deal; US hits back at Shuvalov's comments on WTO accession; fears of new Russian incursion prevalent in Georgia; priests find new role in crisis; Communists present Stalin as economic inspirationThe Kremlin claims that the US deal with Kyrgyzstan to continue using the Manas air base was approved by Russia in 'support all steps aimed at stabilizing the situation in Afghanistan'.  A Russian diplomat would appear to differ; saying that the news was 'a very unpleasant surprise for us -- we did not expect such a trick'.  The US has hit back against Igor Shuvalov's claims that Washington and the EU were to blame for Russia's decision to back out of ...

TODAY: Medvedev gives positive signs to US on START; Ingushetia President critically ill after assassination attempt; Surkov backs multiparty cooperation; political art unwelcome at the Kremlin  Russia has announced that it is ready to 'reduce by several times the number of nuclear delivery vehicles compared with the START-1 pact', as negotiations with the US proceed.  This pledge is contingent upon Washington allaying Russia's fears about missile defense in Europe.  Sergei Lavrov has asserted that the US is clear about Russia's position on this issue.  Medvedev hopes for 'more confidence in relations'.  On the potential problems awaiting Barack Obama in Moscow, a Moscow Times commentator argues that,  'If Obama takes a value-based approach, ...

Matthias Schepp of Der Spiegel writes about the threats facing the staff of Novaya Gazeta:

Olga seemed simultaneously awestruck and wary as she ran her fingers across the envelope. The sender seemed to be important: the "Presidential Administration." Was it mail from the Kremlin? "But the envelope felt strange," says Olga, who is secretary to the editor-in-chief of the Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta.

When she finally opened the envelope, she felt something cold and leathery inside: the severed ears of a donkey. "One needs strong nerves here," she says. Four of the newspaper's journalists have already been murdered, and one of its attorneys was shot dead in broad daylight.

The donkey ears were followed a few days later by a bloody piece of meat. This time there was no return address on the envelope. And then a peculiar man offered the editor-in-chief a

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Earlier today there were reports that Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has ordered the immediate formation of a government commission empowered to fight back against "false history."  It remains unclear exactly what these powers may include - it could be a reinvention of the Soviet GLAVLIT censorship bureau, or something much more mildly rhetorical - but in terms of linguistics, the high ground has been seized.  So swiftly a topic as vast as history, how it is taught, portrayed in media, or even remembered, has been placed into an unnatural dichotomy.  It is either "true" (what the Kremlin says), or "false" (which is anything the state chooses to disagree with).The formation of this history commission was preceded by Medvedev's comments in a May 7 video blog post coinciding with the Victory Day parades in Moscow: ...

José Miguel Vivanco, the Americas director of Human Rights Watch, has published an opinion article in today's Washington Post criticizing the human rights abuses of the Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez.  Although I am certainly influenced by the fact that I represent political prisoners in both Russia and Venezuela, I can't help but read Vivanco's piece and see some strong comparative parallels between the processes, trends, and methodologies used by both Vladimir Putin and his Latin American counterpart with respect to managing their human rights and democratic shortcomings. 

The growing convergence of the Russia-Venezuela relationship is one that should be obvious just from the newspaper headlines.  No sooner had Chávez made his relatively small nation of 26 million citizens the #1 buyer

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I caught the following excerpt over on World Politics Review by Daria Solovieva, which takes a cursory look at the relationship between Russia's economic boom times and the low level of political activity on behalf of citizens - more or less alluding to the classic authoritarian model of giving up your rights in exchange for economic prosperity.  Nowadays, with the crunch of the crisis bearing down, studies are showing that Russians have a growing interest in the administration public affairs, and may even like to have a say in the matter - a trend that has the Kremlin hastily responding to install doppleganger liberals like NIkita Belykh and token human rights measures like paroling Svetlana Bakhmina.  But that's all just a ruse, especially if the dark lord Vladislav Surkov continues to boast that "the system is working."  It ...

Today Vedomosti is reporting that President Dmitry Medvedev could resign in 2009 in order to clear the way for the return of Vladimir Putin. Citing an unidentified source close to the Kremlin, it is believed that following Medvedev's proposal to change the constitution to extend the presidential term from four to six years, he would undertake a number of unpopular and politically damaging social reforms (i.e. - a ruble devaluation), and then resign to clear the way for the reinstatement of Vladimir Putin as part of a plan drawn up by the sovereign democracy godfather Vladislav Surkov. Putin could then rule for two six year terms from 2009 to 2021, though his spokesman is denying it. We believe that the leak of this kind of story, as in the past, is a way to test the waters of local and international reaction.