The Times (Great Britain): "World Agenda: Is the economic crisis driving Medvedev to a new glasnost?"
Tony Halpin
Spot the split is the current favourite game in Russia as Kremlin-watchers look for evidence of division between President Medvedev and his mentor Vladimir Putin, the Prime Minister.
The economic crisis is piling pressure on the regime but there is little hard evidence of a falling out. Instead, something potentially more interesting is happening.
Mr Medvedev is relaxing the system he inherited from Mr Putin in what appears to be a conscious response to the crisis. More strikingly, he seems to have decided to trust the people.
The past few days have offered small but significant examples. Mr Medvedev told regional politicians on Friday that criticism of goverment policies aimed at tackling the crisis were "permissible and even necessary".
Protesters marched through the streets of Vladivostock on Sunday demanding that Mr Putin - or "LiliPut" as many placards dismissively described the former president - should resign. The march had been sanctioned by the authorities, in contrast to one in December which was broken up by riot police flown in from Moscow.
Police did intervene at another anti-government demonstration in Moscow, but only to arrest dozens of pro-Kremlin youth activists who were trying to disrupt it.
Mr Medvedev has opted for regular interviews on state television to explain Kremlin policy to the public. He acknowledged on Sunday that unemployment stood at six million arther than two million, as official figures show.
"This figure has, perhaps, been voiced for the first time, although it is not a big secret," Mr Medvedev told viewers. For Russians, long used to being lied to by their leaders, it was refreshingly honest.
Mr Medvedev has also ordered ministers to go out and explain their work to the public after complaining that the Government was "working very slowly".
His top aide, Arkady Dvorkovich, even suggested that Russia's current political elite was not up to coping with the crisis. This prompted a tart denial from Vladimir Surkov, the Deputy Chief of Staff and inventor of the term "sovereign democracy" to describe Mr Putin's style of government.
The President has reached out to critics, appointing Nikita Belykh, a former opposition leader, as governor of the Kirov region. When the head of the Central Elections Commission dismissed opposition claims of widespread cheating in recent regional elections, Mr Medvedev told him to investigate.
We should not get carried away. Russia remains an authoritarian regime with a tight grip on the media, a puppet parliament controlled by Mr Putin and a deeply politicised legal system, as the latest trial against Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the former Yukos chief, demonstrates.
But if this is not yet a "Moscow Spring" it is also far from the repressive reflex that many old Russia hands expected. In the search for signs of a traditional Kremlin power struggle at times of tension, we may be in danger of missing a truly new development.
If Mr Medvedev has really seized on the economic difficulties as an opportunity to foster a more pluralist and tolerant politics, then the crisis may turn out to be good news for Russians after all.
