Moscow June 10, 2002: - Soccer fans taking out their frustrations on a car parked across the street from the Duma after watching the national team lose to Japan in the World Cup finals Sunday. Drunken soccer fans rioted in downtown Moscow on Sunday, leaving at least one man dead and dozens injured, in the worst street violence the capital has seen since the bombing of the parliament building in 1993. The boisterous crowd, made up predominantly of young men, set fire to cars, broke windows and beat up anyone from fellow fans to police officers as the Russian national team lost to Japan in an important -- but not deciding -- match of the World Cup tournament. Some 7,000 to 8,000 fans had gathered at Manezh Square, a stone's throw from the Kremlin, to watch the afternoon game on one of several huge screens set up by the city government, Moscow police chief Vladimir Pronin told reporters. Only 120 police officers had been dispatched to maintain order at the downtown site, where about 500 fans watched last week as Russia defeated Tunisia in its debut at the tournament.
Sunday's melee began during the second half of the match, soon after the Japanese had scored what would be their winning goal and Russia failed to even the score with a devastating missed shot. Brothers Nikolai and Alexei Panin, 16 and 18, who had been among the viewers, said the crowd was full of drunken fans, who sent beer and vodka bottles sailing into the air as it became clearer that Russia would not make a comeback. "The bottles rained back down on people. There was a lot of bleeding and a lot of guys bandaging their heads," Alexei said. Soon after, the brothers saw a fist fight break out nearby and spread like a ripple effect through the crowd. "The cops didn't do anything," Alexei said, adding that the fight raged on for at least 15 minutes before police tried to interfere. By early evening, several hundred rioters moved up Tverskaya Ulitsa smashing store windows and glass advertising stands. Most windows on the first two floors of the Moskva hotel were broken, as were several windows at the State Duma and the historic Yeliseyevsky food store on Tverskaya. Half a dozen restaurants on the fashionable pedestrian strip Kamergersky Pereulok were also vandalized. At least seven cars near the Duma had been torched and dozens throughout the downtown area had been overturned or smashed.
Firefighters arrived before police did and the rioters attacked their trucks, The Associated Press said. Interfax reported that an ambulance was set on fire and its driver and a doctor were beaten. When police did arrive , some fans reportedly tried to help detain rioters. As of 10:30 p.m., some 60 people had been detained and about 50 hospitalized, Interfax reported, citing police and health authorities. Conflicting reports continued into the evening about the man who had been reported killed. The cause appeared to be knife wounds, but some officials said the unidentified victim had been killed before the match. Many Muscovites, including prominent politicians like Duma Speaker Gennady Seleznyov, blamed the disaster on the city government and police. In a call-in survey of 2,242 people on TVS television, 745 callers said law enforcement officials were responsible, while 1,113 said they blamed the "politicians" who organized the public broadcasts. Only 384 callers blamed the marauding fans. Moscow officials insisted the violence was not their fault. "The fans' actions were barbaric," Deputy Mayor Valery Shantsev told reporters. "We put up these screens for them, like in civilized places, but it turned out they were not ready for this." Police chief Pronin said he assessed his men's response to the violence as "positive," adding that the rioters were not fans but "a drunken throng."
Interfax quoted Mayor Yury Luzhkov's spokesman Sergei Tsoi as saying that City Hall had decided to suspend the big-screen broadcasts. Tsoi also called on journalists who had filmed or photographed the riot to submit their pictures to investigators to help identify the guilty. Shantsev said the city would reimburse car and store owners whose property was damaged during the rampage. But victims of the violence said this could prove difficult, as many police officers refused to fill out reports or document the damage. A number of witnesses and news reports said that some rioters were screaming out racist and neo-fascist slogans. The crowd included some vocal supporters of Alexei Podberyozkin's nationalist Spiritual Heritage movement and other waving the ultra-right's yellow, white and black flag. Television reports said that a Japanese student in Moscow to watch the 12th Tchaikovsky music competition had been beaten by soccer fans, but Interfax later clarified that the attack had taken place before the start of the match. The student was treated by a doctor at the Japanese embassy, the report said. State-run RTR television, which often displays a pro-Kremlin stance in its news programs, tried to shore up some political capital after the riot. Commenting during the Vesti program, anchorman Yevgeny Revenko pointed out that the violence broke out meters away from the Duma, where just last week deputies gave initial approval to a controversial bill on extremism, which human rights activists have condemned as a potential Kremlin tool to suppress public protest. "Today's events prove how necessary this bill really is," Revenko said. He added that "it was clear" why the Communists and Agrarians voted down the bill, but wondered rhetorically why it had been opposed by the liberal Yabloko party, "whose constituency is usually so sensitive to any manifestations of extremism." Yabloko lawmaker Sergei Mitrokhin said in an interview with Revenko that a separate focus of the investigation should be what he called "inaction" by police and whom, if anyone, it benefited. "A common motto of the police is to be prepared for and to prevent terrorist attacks. Now, all of a sudden, [we have] such behavior when not terrorists but ordinary hoodlums, drunk with their own impunity, have gone this far," he said. "At a certain stage, the main cause behind these pogroms was precisely the impunity of these thugs." A driver standing next to his destroyed Volkswagen near Manezh Square called the fans "pigs." "I knew these kinds of things happened in England. But to think it could happen here, that's just so painful."
"This expresses with perfect clarity the basic idea of Marxism with
regard to the historical role and the meaning of the state. The
state is a product and a manifestation of the irreconcilability
of class antagonisms. The state arises where, when and insofar
as class antagonism objectively cannot be reconciled. And, con-
versely, the existence of the state proves that the class antagon-
isms are irreconcilable." (V I Lenin quotes Engels in CW Volume 25
pp. 381-492 The State and Revolution)
United Nations, Moscow, June 3, 2002: - AIDS may seem like an issue that applies primarily to countries far away from home, in Africa and elsewhere. Or it may seem a disease that affects only certain people, outside the mainstream of life. But today, the fastest-growing AIDS epidemic in the world is in the Commonwealth of Independent States. Russia has the fastest-growing problem of all. In those CIS countries where the population is declining, even a relatively small-scale HIV epidemic is enough to cause demographic devastation. If left unchecked, the impact of AIDS on economic growth and the supply of labor and skills will leave no sector of society untouched -- not government, not businesses, not families nor individuals. The situation is especially severe because across the whole CIS, it is young adults -- the future of society -- who are the most affected. The countries of the CIS, together with the international community, face a task of desperate urgency in preventing this epidemic from spinning out of control. That work begins with facing up to the full scale of the problem. Government leaders have begun taking some steps in the right direction: In Russia, the government has increased the budget for the 2002-06 National AIDS Program; in Ukraine, President Leonid Kuchma has declared 2002 the year for the fight against AIDS.
But let us be clear: To make a real difference against the insidious enemy that AIDS represents, the battle must be joined in every sector and at every level of society. This will require three fundamental components: partnership, resources and action by young people as champions for change. However, we know from experience that the very environment of transition -- changing social structures, movement of people, new patterns of behavior -- creates an ideal ground for the spread of the HIV virus. In this environment, it is young people who are more likely to be infected and to pass on the virus to others. (Such things just did not exist in the USSR, previous to 1985 when "market reforms" were introduced by "perestroika" and "glasnost!" Ed.). Moreover, research has shown that in many CIS countries, an alarmingly small minority of teenagers know how to avoid becoming infected with HIV. And that is why it is so important that programs to educate young people should be developed in each country. Also, it should be explained to people that stigmatizing high-risk groups and imagining that everyone else is safe from infection, is both morally and factually wrong. When it comes to the spread of AIDS, the separation between human beings is only skin-deep. No one should imagine that we can protect ourselves by building barriers between "us" and "them." In the ruthless world of AIDS, there is no us and them.
Kaspiisk, Russia April 9, 2002 - A remote-controlled bomb shattered a holiday parade Thursday in a Russian town near Chechnya, killing at least 36 people, including children and members of a marching band that had just struck up the tune "Victory Day." Streams of blood trickled down the tree-lined road after the blast, which injured about 150. A mangled drum heaped with flowers lay next to a pile of abandoned horns and an empty boot. No one claimed responsibility, but regional officials blamed Islamic militants who have organized previous attacks in the restive region, Dagestan. A 1996 blast in a Kaspiisk building that housed Russian border guards killed 68 people. Officials never determined who was responsible. On Thursday, a marine band had just started playing the namesake song of Victory Day, which honors the anniversary of the Allied defeat of the Nazis in World War II. Children ran in front, cheered on by veterans, as the musicians and other servicemen headed to the cemetery in the Caspian Sea port of Kaspiisk for a wreath-laying ceremony. Then the bomb — an anti-personnel mine, packed with metal fragments, according to witnesses — blew up.
"When I got there, I saw a mound of bodies, people in panic," said Magomad Akhmedov, a 35-year-old teacher. "Someone began giving first aid, some started to bind people's wounds and stop the blood with whatever they could find." Aminat Kuliyeva's children were playing on the street during the celebration. "When I heard the blast I ran out to search for them, and I froze," Kuliyeva said. "All around were the dead, lots of blood, people screaming." Eighteen servicemen — most of them musicians — 13 children and five adult bystanders were killed in the Kaspiisk blast, said a duty officer in the Dagestan department of the Emergency Situations Ministry. NTV television showed footage shot minutes after the explosion. Soldiers in camouflage uniforms lay sprawled in the middle of the street, blood streaming from their wounds. Men carried limp children to waiting ambulances, as policemen shooed away shocked bystanders still clutching flowers they had planned to lay at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. Screams filled the air.
The explosion was the latest of a series of terrorist and criminal attacks that have rocked the southern region. But coming on Victory Day, it shocked and angered people across Russia. News of the explosion broke during the annual military parade on Red Square, where thousands of troops marched past Russian President Vladimir Putin and World War II veterans. Putin appointed the head of the Federal Security Service to oversee the investigation into what he called a terrorist act. "Today is the dearest holiday for our people. ... Today's act was committed by scum for whom nothing is sacred," he told guests at a Victory Day reception. "We have the right to view (the perpetrators) as we view Nazis, as those whose purpose is to sow terror and kill. "But however difficult the tasks before us today, they will be solved." The mine was enclosed in a metal canister and was equivalent in force of 6-11 pounds of TNT, according to the regional Interior Ministry. It was hidden under greenery in a ditch along Lenin Street, the main street of Kaspiisk. Unlike normal practice, there were no police cordons along the route to the cemetery, Patrushev said.
In contrast to other blasts in the Caucasus region, officials did not rush to blame Chechen rebels. Prosecutors believed the attack was staged by Islamic militants based in the region, members of the strict Wahhabi branch of Islam. Dagestan sees frequent small-scale bombings and other unrest, often spillover violence from Chechnya. "This terrorist act was aimed at destabilizing the situation in Dagestan," said Abdul Musayev, spokesman for the regional Interior Ministry. Prosecutor general Imam Yaraliyev expressed hope that an alleged Dagestani terrorist who was detained earlier this week, Zaur Akabov, would reveal who had organized the blast. Meanwhile, rebels fired on a stadium in the Chechen capital of Grozny, where Russian forces and Chechen civilians had gathered for Victory Day celebrations. Four police officers were wounded, according to an official in Chechnya's Moscow-backed administration. Other rebel attacks around the republic in the last 24 hours killed four Russian servicemen and wounded seven, the official said on condition of anonymity. While large-scale fighting in Chechnya has subsided, rebels continue to stage raids and mine blasts that kill Russian troops daily. Chechnya won de facto independence after a 1994-6 war between separatists and Russian troops. Russian forces returned in 1999 after Chechnya-based rebels invaded Dagestan and a series of apartment house bombings around Russia left 300 dead. The bombings were blamed on rebels.
Moscow March 19, 2002: - Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov told The Times of London last week that Moscow opposed any U.S. strike on Iraq but made it clear that Russia would not withdraw from the coalition against terrorism even if the Bush administration decided to attack Baghdad unilaterally. He indicated that participation in this coalition served such vital Russian interests that it couldn't be jeopardized by pushing disagreements over Iraq to the limit. This pragmatic position, despite some strong criticism in the State Duma, makes it possible to avoid the inevitable international humiliation other options are likely to entail for Russia. Washington's determination to confront Iraq over weapons of mass destruction presents Moscow with both a challenge and an opportunity. There is a need: to avoid disrupting the cooperative relationship with the United States in which President Vladimir Putin has invested so much political capital; to secure debt repayment and the significant commercial interests of Russian companies in a post-Saddam Iraq; and to reaffirm Russia's role as a leading player on a major international issue by preserving the centrality of the UN Security Council in dealing with Iraq. Any successful strategy for achieving these objectives is likely to include the following elements: The exploitation of fissures within the Bush administration in order to convince it of the need to exhaust the inspections option. Verifying the elimination of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction through a rigorous inspection regime in accordance with UN armistice Resolution 687 is the only legitimate objective the international community can support. Only Baghdad's obstruction of a serious international effort to readmit inspectors could provide any semblance of legitimacy to U.S. military action against Iraq. Here's more!
Moscow February 22, 2002: - A group of 20 retired generals and admirals have written a scathing open letter to President Vladimir Putin attacking his reforms and charging him with pursuing the same ruinous policies as his predecessor. The broadside, published on the front page of the hard-line communist Sovietskaya Rossiya daily, accuses Putin of betraying voters who elected him to office in March 2000 following the snap resignation of Boris Yeltsin. The letter -- headlined, "Who Will Answer for the Disintegration?" -- was signed among others by former Defense Minister Igor Rodionov and two other members of parliament. Its authors said Putin had "lied to the people and betrayed their interests. Today it is obvious that the president is not for the people but those who robbed and continue to rob them."
The "tragic consequences" of the Yeltsin and Putin years "cannot even be compared to the Nazi aggression during the Great Patriotic War," the letter said, referring to the German invasion of the Soviet Union during World War II. The letter attacked Putin for allowing U.S. forces to be based in Central Asia, Moscow's traditional sphere of influence, as part of the war on terrorism in Afghanistan. "These bases are not a strike against [Osama] bin Laden, but in reality against Russia's interests," they said, echoing the view of many in Russia's current military establishment. "Russia's international policy has become the policy of horse-trading the state's interests," it added, criticizing Putin's order to close a key base in Cuba used to spy on the United States, Moscow's erstwhile Cold War arch-rival. The letter, which concluded with a call for a referendum on reinstating socialism and the planned economy, was published 48 hours before "Defender of the Fatherland Day," which in Soviet times was known as Army Day. For more on this click here
.Moscow February 22, 2002: - President Vladimir Putin said Friday that North American athletes have a "clear" advantage at the Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, but indicated Russia will not boycott the rest of the games. Russians have been outraged by several developments at the Olympics, including Thursday's disqualification of a star Russian skier from a cross-country relay following a blood test. The Russian delegation also has formally challenged the judging at Thursday night's women's figure skating final in which an American jumped from fourth place to the gold medal. A Russian was left with the silver medal.
Some Russian Olympic officials threatened to leave the games unless their concerns are addressed, but Putin suggested that would not happen. "North American athletes receive a clear advantage," Putin told journalists at the Kremlin. "Let us see how the Olympic Games end. Let us hope that the IOC leadership will manage to solve these difficulties." Even as he spoke, the lower house of Russia's parliament passed a resolution calling on Russian athletes to boycott Sunday's closing ceremonies unless Olympic officials rerun the cross-country relay, bar North American referees from Friday's hockey semifinal between Russia and the United States and apologize to the Russian Olympic team. The resolution was approved 417-0. "Russian athletes are practically being mocked today. It's an attempt to discredit Russian sports and oust Russian athletes from the sports arena," said Alexei Volin, deputy chief of staff of the Russian Cabinet.
The Hague February 15, 2002: - Slobodan Milosevic returned to the attack at his war crimes trial on Friday, accusing NATO of ''bestial'' genocide in Yugoslavia and demanding ex-U.S. President Bill Clinton and other Western leaders come to testify. ``I'm asking what kind of tribunal this is if you refuse to try people for these crimes by the leaders and armies of NATO countries,'' Milosevic said to judges in the Hague. The former Yugoslav president, in his second day of reply to his prosecutors' opening addresses, blamed the bloodshed of the 1990s entirely on his Balkan enemies and NATO.
On the fourth day of what is forecast to be a marathon case, he insisted the hundreds of thousands of ethnic Albanians who fled Kosovo in 1999 during the NATO air war against Yugoslavia had been driven out not by Serbs, as internationally reported, but by their fellow Albanians. The guerrilla Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) ``referred to all Albanians who did not flee Kosovo as traitors,'' he said, creating an ``illusion of exodus.'' ``There were hundreds of cameras waiting at the borders to show alleged Serb misdeeds.'' The motive was to justify NATO's attack. Milosevic showed the court pictures of carbonized bodies of civilians killed by NATO bombs in Kosovo and the rest of Serbia in 1999. NATO bombs destroyed the Chinese embassy in Belgrade, in what Washington insisted was a mistake by Central Intelligence Agency target planners using an outdated map. ``It is quite clear that Clinton wanted to go down in history as the first man to bomb Chinese territory by bombing the Chinese embassy,'' Milosevic said. ``This was no accident.'' For more on Yugoslavia click here
But even more than the United States, it was Germany which Milosevic singled out for condemnation. He said it destroyed old communist Yugoslavia by its support from Slovenian and Croatian independence, and by secret backing of Albanian ''terrorists.'' ``The German intelligence service rallied up criminals from all over Europe. They were pushed to Kosovo,'' he said. Accusing NATO of the widespread use of especially lethal ''cluster bombs,'' he showed the court a photograph of a Serb peasant woman killed while plowing her field and the corpses of children dressed in their pajamas. ``This is an example of bestiality, targeting people in this way,'' he said, adding that NATO had bombed at night to maximize deaths among sleeping civilians. (Just like the US did and does in Afghanistan). He produced pictures of bomb-shattered hospitals, an old people's home, buses, houses and workplaces, some strewn with charred and bloodied bodies. After NATO occupied Kosovo in June 1999, they allowed Serbs to be killed or forced out by Albanian ``terrorists'' and ''savages.'' More than 100 Serb Orthodox churches were razed in a campaign he likened to Taliban destruction of Buddhist statues. Echoing the language of his own indictment, Milosevic said the West had committed ``genocide and crimes against humanity.'' ``I am going to call witnesses here and I want it to be possible to question Clinton and Albright and Kinkel and Schroeder and Kohl and Dini... Kofi Annan... Blair,'' he said, listing Western and U.N. leaders involved in Balkan peace talks.
In Moscow which vehemently opposed the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia, the Russian parliament on Friday branded the Hague tribunal a ``political'' court which had failed to charge NATO states for atrocities during the air war. A Duma (lower house) motion expressed ``deep concern over the activities of the International Tribunal,'' saying it had ''ignored serious breaches of international humanitarian law carried out by the member states of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. ``We are deeply concerned that the prosecution of individuals by the tribunal is of a political character,'' the Duma added.
The confident, forcefully-spoken Milosevic, who lampooned his prosecuting lawyers on Thursday from the dock where he sits before a deskful of documents, again goaded them personally. ``The prosecutor is probably bored, I can see him yawning,'' he said of one lawyer, as the court viewed grim photographs of burned and mutilated bodies of children on the monitor screens dotted around the high-tech tribunal chamber. Milosevic was deported from Belgrade seven months ago to a jail cell in the Hague. He has been indicted for crimes against humanity in Kosovo in 1999 and in Croatia in 1991-2, and for genocide in the 1992-5 Bosnian war. Earlier this week prosecutors portrayed him as the prime culprit in a decade of Serb aggression which led to massacres, torture, mass rapes and expulsions of populations from their homes across former Yugoslavia. ``He is tired... after so many hours in court but he's in good shape,'' his Belgrade legal adviser, Dragoslav Ognjanovic, said late on Thursday after visiting Milosevic in prison. After addressing the international court for around four hours on Thursday, the 60-year-old spoke by telephone to his wife and loyal supporter, Mira Markovic, from the U.N. detention center at The Hague, Ognjanovic said. Dressed in a navy suit and a tie in the red, blue and white Serbian colors, Milosevic sits flanked by seated guards in a courtroom sealed off from the public gallery by a bullet-proof glass wall and equipped with computer screens, cameras and simultaneous interpreters in four languages. He is conducting his own defense, after refusing to appoint defense counsel or enter a formal plea on the grounds the court has no right to judge him, but is advised by Belgrade lawyers.
Judges have entered not guilty pleas on his behalf and appointed three lawyers as ``friends of the court'' to ensure Milosevic gets a fair trial. The ``friends'' on Friday appealed for him to be given leeway in the length of his address. Observers said the legal value to his case of his counter-accusations against NATO was doubtful, but they could have a powerful political impact, especially in Yugoslavia. The reformist Yugoslav government, which handed Milosevic to the Hague, on Friday called his testimony a ``disgusting'' misuse of images of death and destruction to deflect personal blame. Milosevic could face life in prison if convicted at the end of an epic trial some expect to last at least two years.
Washington December 13, 2001: - In a historic break with Russia, President Bush served formal notice Thursday that the United States is withdrawing from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, a move effective in six months. ``I have concluded the ABM treaty hinders our government's ability to develop ways to protect our people from future terrorist or rogue-state missile attacks,'' Bush said. ``Defending the American people is my highest priority as commander in chief and I cannot and will not allow the United States to remain in a treaty that prevents us from developing effective defenses,'' Bush said. Russian President Vladimir Putin, who got word from Bush last week that the United States was withdrawing, said in an address broadcast from Moscow, ``This step was not a surprise for us. However, we consider it a mistake.'' For more click here
Moscow December 12, 2001: - Russia is aware the United States may soon unveil plans to withdraw from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty and is monitoring the situation carefully, Interfax news agency said on Wednesday. A U.S. official who asked not to be identified has said the announcement on withdrawal could come as early as Thursday. And the White House says the time is near to move beyond the ABM treaty, which prohibits the kind of national missile defense system the United States wants to develop. Interfax quoted a senior Foreign Ministry official as saying the Russian leadership was aware of the U.S. intention and that it was ``not dramatizing this situation and will keep an attentive eye on the development of events.''
A formal U.S. move to withdraw requires six months' notice, so any announcement would signal the start of this period. But while Russia sees the treaty as the cornerstone of strategic stability, President Bush regards it as a relic of the Cold War and has long made clear his determination to ditch it. The ABM treaty rules out the sort of shield Bush wants to build to protect the United States from attacks by so-called ''rogue states'' like North Korea, Iraq and Libya. Moscow partly shares Washington's concerns, but says the danger is exaggerated and that international terrorism poses a more pressing threat. The two sides have agreed to pursue talks on the issue in tandem with deep cuts to their nuclear arsenals. In recent months -- especially since the September 11 attacks -- Moscow has shown more willingness to work with Washington on the issue, including discussing a possible compromise to keep the treaty in force while giving the United States wide scope to test and develop missile defenses. After talks in Moscow this week, Secretary of State Colin Powell told reporters the two sides ``still have disagreements'' on ABM but would continue working on the issue.
Washington December 11, 2001: - President Bush will soon give Russia notice that the United States is withdrawing from the 1972 nuclear treaty that bans testing of missile defense systems, U.S. government officials said Tuesday. He will announce the decision in the next several days, effectively invoking a clause in the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty that requires the United States and Russia to give six months' notice before abandoning the pact. Initial White House plans called for announcing the decision Thursday, but officials cautioned that date could change. The four government officials spoke on condition of anonymity. With the decision, Bush takes the first step toward fulfilling a campaign pledge to develop and deploy an anti-missile system that he says will protect the United States and its allies, including Russia, from missiles fired by rogue nations. Bush has said the September 11 terrorist attacks heightened the need for such a system.
Russia and many U.S. allies have warned Bush that withdrawing from the pact might trigger a nuclear arms race. Critics of the plan also question whether an effective system can be developed without enormous expense. Conservative Republicans have urged Bush to scuttle the ABM, rejecting proposals to amend the pact or find loopholes allowing for tests. The president defended his push for a missile shield during a national security speech Tuesday at the Citadel in South Carolina. ``Last week we conducted another promising test of our missile defense technology,'' Bush said. ``For the good of peace, we're moving forward with an active program to determine what works and what does not work. In order to do so, we must move beyond the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, a treaty that was written in a different era, for a different enemy.'' ``America and our allies must not be bound to the past. We must be able to build the defenses we need against the enemies of the 21st century,'' he said.
According to Bush administration officials, Russian President Vladimir Putin had assured Bush during their October talks in Washington and Crawford, Texas, that U.S.-Russian relations would not suffer even if Bush pulled out of the treaty. They said Bush's decision reflects a desire by the Pentagon to conduct tests in the next six months or so that would violate the ABM. The decision came as Secretary of State Colin Powell, in Moscow, said Russia and the United States are near agreement on drastic cuts in long-range nuclear arsenals, but remain at odds over a U.S. missile defense.
Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov said the arms-reduction deal could be ready for the next summit between Bush and Putin, tentatively scheduled for Moscow next spring. But the U.S.-Russian disagreement over missile defense is so deep that Russia is bracing for the possibility of a U.S. withdrawal from the landmark 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty, Ivanov told a joint news conference with Powell at the Kremlin. ``The positions of the sides remain unchanged,'' Ivanov said.
Despite the missile-defense impasse, both Ivanov and Powell were upbeat about prospects for wrapping up a deal to reduce nuclear warheads. Powell said he was taking Bush a Russian recommendation on arms cuts that responds to Bush's announcement last month that the United States would cut its nuclear arsenal over the next decade by two-thirds, from just under 6,000 warheads now to between 1,700 and 2,200. Powell did not disclose specifics. But a senior State Department official, briefing reporters on Powell's plane, said the Russian recommendation was in the same ball park as the Bush announcement. Ivanov said Russia prefers to see the reductions presented in treaty form. Bush has opposed such a move in the past, suggesting that the reductions should be put on less formal grounds.
Brussels, Belgium December 10, 2001: - NATO and Russia agreed Friday to draw closer in the interest of greater security for all, starting work on creating a new council to solve common problems ranging from civil emergencies to missile defense. "What we are talking about is a mechanism that will enable us to draft and adopt decisions together on the crucial issues of security that will correspond to the spirit of the age," said Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov after meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell and his NATO counterparts at allied headquarters. "We have turned an important corner in NATO-Russia relations." The 19-nation alliance wants to take advantage of Moscow's cooperation in the fight against terrorism to pursue opportunities for joint action at 20.
"There is no issue more important to the security and stability of the Euro-Atlantic area than the further development of a confident and cooperative relationship between us," said NATO Secretary-General George Robertson. Besides the struggle against terrorism, Russia and NATO suggested in a joint statement that they could work together in such areas as crisis management,nonproliferation, arms control, theater missile defense, search and rescue at sea, military-to-military cooperation and civil emergencies. "We are not abandoning our principles or prerogatives," Robertson said. "No nonmember can veto the alliance's decisions. This is about working together more effectively when it is in all our interests to do so." Ivanov said Russia is not interested in joining the alliance."Russia has no intention to queue up for membership in NATO, among other nations," he said, adding that the goal is "to establish a stable, predictable system of security in the Euro-Atlantic area. "We think we must proceed with no undue delays. In the early part of next year we intend to come up with some specific proposals for a new mechanism and the substance that it will address."
President Vladimir Putin said in Athens, where he is on an official visit, that there is no hurry to create the new council. "Russia is not desperately knocking on the door of NATO," he said. On Thursday, the ministers told their ambassadors at NATO headquarters to start working out details of a new arrangement.
"The precise nature and scope of this mechanism will require substantial work over the coming months," Robertson said, but the plan is to have it in place by the next meeting of allied foreign ministers in May in Reykjavik, Iceland. NATO officials insist the alliance will not be hampered by the new effort at cooperation and if it is not possible to reach a decision with Russia, NATO's ruling council will simply meet at 19 and make its decisions without Russia. Since 1997, consultations have been held under the NATO-Russia Permanent Joint Council, a forum originally created to ease Moscow's fears about NATO enlargement. But both sides say the PJC has never been satisfactory and more often than not the alliance uses it to inform Russia of positions already taken. Asked how Russia would benefit from this new arrangement, given that NATO could still make decisions on its own whether Moscow liked it or not, Robertson said "the answer is more in chemistry than in arithmetic."
Moscow November 13, 2001: - In the days and weeks leading up to President Vladimir Putin's summit with President George W. Bush, the focus was on the future of the ABM Treaty and on what essentially would be a START III, an agreement to cut strategic nuclear arsenals. Officials shuttled back and forth between Washington and Moscow, hinting after each meeting that the two sides were getting closer. Putin came out over the weekend and told American journalists that he was "very optimistic" a compromise could be found on the ABM Treaty, which forbids the U.S. to develop a national missile defense shield. And U.S. officials indicated that Bush was prepared to agree to a Russian proposal to slash the number of warheads held by both countries by as much as two-thirds.
At the same time, Bush's national security advisor, Condoleeza Rice, cautioned that no specific deal could be expected from the three-day visit: "Not every meeting has to be accompanied like the old summits were with the Soviet Union by arms control agreements." Rice went on to say that the Russian-U.S. relationship "is larger than the security relationship. And so economic relations are important, political relations are important. This is a very different relationship now." Rice is right. The relationship is larger than the security relationship. And while Russia has long pushed Washington for a drastic reduction in strategic arms, Putin now wants more. After the September 11 attacks, Putin made a series of gestures to the United States. In standing firmly behind the U.S. anti-terrorism campaign, he opened the way for the deployment of U.S. troops in Central Asia. He promised to close Russia's listening post in Cuba and naval base in Vietnam, two symbols of its past influence in the world. We could argue that none of these steps was a concession to the United States, but a pragmatic move that furthered Russia's own interests. (Notice that Putin did not bow to the West at all over Iraq or Iran.)
But that is not how Putin's actions have been seen by Russia's military and political elite, who fear that once again Russia is giving without getting anything in return. In order to overcome the discontent, Putin needs to come back from the United States with some tangible results. What Putin wants is U.S. support for redefining Russia's relationship with NATO and for putting Russia on track to join the World Trade Organization. Both are well within Washington's power, and here, too, we could argue that we're not talking about concessions to a former foe. Integrating Russia into the West economically and politically would do more for U.S. security than any deal on NMD.
MOSCOW November 13, 2001: - President Vladimir Putin said Monday that Russia will send humanitarian aid to Cuba to help the communist nation cope with the aftermath of a devastating hurricane. "The Cuban population needs urgent support," Putin said during a meeting with government ministers, Itar-Tass reported.
Washington November 13, 2001: - President Bush pledged Tuesday to reduce the United States' long-range nuclear arsenal by two-thirds or more over the next decade, to between 1,700 and 2,200 warheads. Russian President Vladimir Putin said he would ``try to respond in kind.'' Emerging from their first White House summit, Bush said his decision would leave the United States with a supply of warheads ``fully consistent with American security.''More...
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Brussels, Belgium October 3, 2001: - The European Union promised Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday that it would accelerate efforts to bring Russia into the World Trade Organization and boost security cooperation with Moscow to help stamp out international terrorism. EU and NATO leaders expressed delight with Putin's support for the anti-terror campaign that is emerging in response to last month's attacks on the United States. NATO's chief said Russia and the alliance have turned a corner in their often testy relations. Putin and EU officials announced their security cooperation would include action to block terrorist finances and exchanges of intelligence on terrorist suspects, movements of chemical, biological and nuclear material, the use of false documents and other terrorist activity.
EU Trade Commission Pascal Lamy said he will ``accelerate'' preparatory work on Russia's WTO entry. ``As Russia's main trading partner, the EU strongly supports Russia's goal of joining the WTO,'' he said in a statement, adding that the United States will also pull for Russia. Lamy said the EU will give Moscow an outline by the end of the year of what it needs to do to comply with world trade rules, and that the United States would do likewise. As a result, work on Russia's coveted entry into the WTO ``will receive fresh impetus early next year,'' he said. Putin's talks with EU officials and his meeting with NATO Secretary-General Lord Robertson were dominated by international efforts to combat terrorism. Both Putin and Robertson suggested the gathering global efforts to fight terrorism can bring Russia and NATO closer together. ``These discussions mark a major milestone in the NATO-Russia relationship,'' Robertson said at a news conference with Putin. ``We have identified a number of new areas where NATO and Russia can work together.''
Russia remains opposed to the eastward expansion of NATO, which has added three former Warsaw Pact nations into its ranks and is likely to accept more in the coming years, including some former Soviet republics. Putin said NATO will not make Europe a safer place by taking in more ex-Soviet bloc allies, but stressed that Russia's relationship with NATO should not be overshadowed by the issue of expansion. Reiterating his determination to cooperate in the fight against terrorism in a news conference with EU foreign policy and security chief Javier Solana, Putin said Europe's security structures should be reviewed to let Russia and the West work more closely against common threats. ``After the tragic events of September 11, the European community has a need to look again at regional security,'' Putin said. ``It's high time to come up with practical solutions.'' He supported the U.S. preparations for what President Bush has termed a war on terrorism, saying an American request for military help from its NATO allies was ``quite appropriate'' and that Russia and the United States are exchanging information on terrorism. ``At the political level, we are extremely satisfied with the way things are developing,'' he said.
Putin has ruled out Russian military involvement in a U.S. strike in Afghanistan, whose Taliban rulers shelter suspected terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden. But he has offered the use of Russian airspace for U.S. humanitarian flights and pledged to help arm the Taliban's opponents. Absent from Wednesday's talks was the usual EU criticism of Russia's military action in Chechnya. Putin repeated Russia's claim that the rebels in Chechnya are linked to international terrorists and said deadly bombings of Russian apartment buildings in 1999, which Russia blamed on the rebels, bore ``the same signature'' as the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
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