VLADIMIR PUTIN
ARCHIVE OF THE OFFICIAL SITE
OF THE 2008-2012 PRIME MINISTER
OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION
VLADIMIR PUTIN
ARCHIVE OF THE OFFICIAL SITE
OF THE 2008-2012 PRIME MINISTER
OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION
VLADIMIR PUTIN
The ordinary Russian, who has been glued to the TV screen for the entire New Year holidays, has no doubts over which country (Russia or Ukraine) disrupted gas supplies to Europe. The situation has been made clear to him. Kommersant-Vlast sought to explain what was really happening and why.
"All this, of course, is a carefully choreographed drama designed to serve the Kremlin's broader agenda. Five countries - Slovakia, Finland, Bosnia, Macedonia and Turkey - rely exclusively on Russia for their gas supplies. Many EU states are dependent for a large proportion of their supplies. Britain is in the fortunate position of depending on Russia for only 2.5% of its gas.
Russia has exerted titanic efforts to keep Europe warm - and even more effort to prove that it was Ukraine that was putting spokes in the wheels.
Vladimir Putin's painting Hoar Frost was auctioned off for more than a million dollars. St Petersburg Governor Valentina Matviyenko has greater experience in art, but her endeavour sold for three times less. The returns of the charity auction in St Petersburg, totalling 70 million roubles, will benefit hospitals and a church.
An urgent gas summit held in Moscow produced an agreement with Ukraine, the Kremlin says. Kiev, however, thinks it has merely distracted Putin and Tymoshenko.
Gazprom has already lost about $1.8 billion as a result of the conflict with Ukraine. Russian Government officials are pondering measures to help the gas concern, including cuts in export duties.
The Prime Ministers of Russia and Ukraine have announced that the gas conflict has been settled. Kiev has agreed to buy Russian natural gas at $360 per 1,000 cubic metres, the newspaper's sources say. Has Ukraine decided to try to live without Russian gas?
The editor of Time magazine did not have to explain why he chose Barack Obama as the Man of the Year in 2008, unlike in 2007, when Vladimir Putin held this title. This time, it was the second place winner who gave rise to questions, as many were surprised to discover that it was French President Nicolas Sarkozy. It was harder for him to be the runner-up than for Obama to occupy the top spot. The new U.S. president is more associated with expectations than with real achievements, whereas last year Sarkozy not only had to overcome numerous domestic and foreign policy problems, but also to disprove his negative image in the eyes of many.
Federal Chancellor Angela Merkel's day planner, published on her website, includes a meeting with Prime Minister Vladimir Putin scheduled for today. The conversation between the two leaders will take place at 4 pm CET and finish with a joint news conference.
Moscow and Kiev are preparing for the crucial battle in the current gas war - a gas summit attended by the leaders of Russia, Ukraine, and European consumers of Russian gas. President Dmitry Medvedev proposed to hold the summit in Moscow, but his Ukrainian counterpart Viktor Yushchenko said that he would attend the meeting only if it took place in the EU, and went to London for moral support. The Kremlin, however, is ready to hold the summit without the Ukrainian leader, especially as Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko arrives in Moscow tomorrow to, according to her press service, "solve all the gas problems."
Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said yesterday that he might reschedule budgeted defence spending. Although the state defence order for 2009 (1 trillion roubles) was left unchanged, both the Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Alexei Kudrin said money could be re-directed from low-priority defence spending items to key defence projects. In addition, the White House, which has failed to make banks issue more loans to industry, is planning non-bank lending for the defence sector and the Central Bank's "special refinancing rates" for defence-friendly banks.
With the New Year holidays over, President Dmitry Medvedev went to the Salyut plant to see how aero-engines are made there. Vladimir Putin had previously formulated the principles of reform in the engine-building branch and the President wanted to know how it went, but Salyut Director Yury Yeliseyev took advantage of the visit to pursue his narrow interests and lobby the President to allow Salyut not to join in the effort. This practice of using VIP visits in corporate interests is not new and does not always achieve its aims. Worse still, such intrigues sometimes jeopardise long-term reform plans for whole industries.
The Russian defence industry is waiting for tax breaks. On Thursday afternoon, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin stayed in Korolyov just outside Moscow, inspecting assembly workshops of the Tactical Missiles Corporation and chairing a meeting that discussed the defence industry situation.
Prime Minister Vladimir Putin is planning a decisive battle in the gas war on his own turf: on Saturday, he wants to reach a transit agreement with Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko and announce the results afterwards to invited representatives from consumer countries.
On Wednesday, Prime Ministers of the countries hit hardest by the gas conflict - Bulgaria, Moldova, and Slovakia - arrived in Moscow. Prime Minister Vladimir Putin was the first to harshly explain Moscow's position. Closer to evening, President Dmitry Medvedev proposed that a summit of countries using or transiting Russian gas be held.
The White House is not in a hurry to react to the President's criticism. It has been three days since Dmitry Medvedev took the Government to task for being slow in fulfilling his anti-crisis directives, but not a single Cabinet member has yet reacted to the criticism. Experts note the striking difference in the degree of readiness with which Kremlin directives are fulfilled compared with the times when Vladimir Putin was President.
The State Duma opened its spring session yesterday on a somber note. Not only was the crisis weighing heavily on deputies' minds, but they also came to the session after attending the funeral of presidential envoy Alexander Kosopkin, who died in an air crash.
President Dmitry Medvedev presided over a high-level conference yesterday devoted to the financial situation. The first such anti-crisis meeting to be held in 2009 decided to take measures to "additionally capitalise" the banking system in the next two weeks and determined the size of state guarantees of loans to the defence industry (70% of the loan) and sector-relevant industrial enterprises (50%). The Kremlin and the White House are still prepared to spend unlimited amounts to treat the "confidence shock" in the economy.
The Communist Party has made demands for the Rossiya TV Channel to give KPRF leader Gennady Zyuganov half of the airtimeallocated to the programme "Conversation with Vladimir Putin", in any format possible.
Gazprom's second attempt to resume gas supplies to Europe via Ukraine has also failed. Ukraine's Naftogaz has again refused to allow the flow of Russian gas to Europe. The pretext is new: the need to fill the pipeline, but the underlying cause is the same: the pipeline is empty because Kiev has siphoned off gas. Meanwhile, the premiers of Russia, Bulgaria, Slovakia, and Moldova had an emotional meeting in Moscow yesterday trying to solve the gas problem. They failed, prompting President Dmitry Medvedev to invite all the countries that get Russian gas via Ukrainian territory to gather for a summit meeting in Moscow on Saturday. Yulia Tymoshenko and Victor Yushchenko were also invited. The current gas crisis can only be solved through a face-to-face meeting.
