May 14, 2008
Stalinism, Siberia and the EU
The European Union’s leaders travel next month to Khanty-Mansiysk for a summit with Dmitry Medvedev, the new Russian president. Will they find time, I wonder, in this booming western Siberian oil town to stop off at the crossroads of Sverdlova and Pionerskaya streets? They should do. There, in front of School No. 5, they will find a recently erected memorial to the victims of Stalin’s repressions - at least, so the town’s government website says.
The existence of this memorial reminds us to think twice before rushing to judge today’s Russia. The country clearly moved to a more authoritarian, centralised form of rule under Vladimir Putin, and civil liberties were curtailed. But many Russians remain as determined as ever to expose the truth about their country’s bloodstained communist past. These days, Stalin cannot be airbrushed from Russia’s history as easily as he used to airbrush his opponents.
Putin’s reordering of Russia and his revival of its great power foreign policy ambitions contributed to a downturn in EU-Russian relations, but none of that makes Russia a monotonal society. As EU enlargement commissioner Olli Rehn said in a thoughtful speech last week: “The rise of the middle class and entrepreneurs in Russia should eventually mean growing demands for property rights and, by extension, legal certainty. This internal dynamic may lead Russia to reform its legal system and make its political system more accountable - but this is certainly not an automatic process by any means.”
Russia’s leaders at present can hardly be said to share the EU’s core values of freedom, democracy and the rule of law. But neither do other countries important to Europe, including, for example, most of its neighbours on the southern shores of the Mediterranean. As with these neighbours, so with Russia - there’s little choice but to try to improve relations.
It would be wrong to kick Russia out of the G8, as John McCain suggested in March - even if that were possible. Rather, the EU and the US should be hard-headed but practical in its dealings with Russia and, above all, recognise that relations with Moscow tend to be at their most difficult when western countries themselves are disunited.
“Experience shows that Russia respects the EU when we are able to adopt united positions, and act accordingly. Conversely, Russia is adept at exploiting disunity among member-states,” David Milliband and Bernard Kouchner, the UK foreign secretary and French foreign minister, wrote in a joint letter in March to the EU’s Slovenian presidency.
All too true. But the Khanty-Mansiysk summit will show whether these wise words were just that - words.
It really strikes me as pure ignorance when you hear such comments as one from John McCain.
I think EU leaders are waking up to the understanding that inclusion and cooperation is more productive then exclusion and isolation. Working together with countries prospers peaceful relations.
I hope one day even old politicians in the US do the same. Even the ones like John McCain who still believe we’re in the Cold War.
As for Putin’s “authoritarian” approach, many understand that this was an essential move to restore some sort of order to a country which was close to collapse from constant power struggles and theft within its politics.
You have to remember, Russia has been democratic for only 16 years (US: virtually since 1788), in which time the US had plenty of wars and conflicts in order to stabilise this system.
Our media seems to enjoy criticism of other nations, but we seem to forgive the mistakes of our own leaders much faster for some reason. Putin had not misled his people, which is why they voted for his party. Bush has misled the American people countless times and yet people will still vote republican.
Posted by: Alex | May 14th, 2008 at 2:44 pm | Report this commentGuys,
Posted by: Vlad | May 14th, 2008 at 6:38 pm | Report this commentcan you be a little bit less arrogant when you write about Russia? Do you think Russia really cares about your “single EU voice”, your “united position”? No, it does not. Russia overthrow the communism and waited for 10 years in the 90th hoping you will start treating it respectfully. Finally, it has realized that in order to be respected it should first learn how to respect itself. Why does Russia must buy Polish meat in order to improve relationships with, let’s say Italy. Or why it should transport its gas through all Baltic states and pay for transit to each of them to remain a friend of Germany. Miliband, do you know the answer?
Russia is a nation of machos, so brushing aside McCain’s approach might be a bit hasty. I think Russia’s ability and potential for dialogue with other civilizations/cultures is overestimated, as the 90s demonstrated. As for Stalinism: even though the new “Czar” deserves a chance, pseudo-Stalinism has been rehabilitated during Putin’s reign.
Posted by: Gustav | May 14th, 2008 at 10:11 pm | Report this commentYou know Tony, even under Stalin iron fist rules, there were more Democracy and Human rights than in your united kingdom. All of soviet republics had his own goverment, women and minorities enojed such rights which your people got only in 1960s. So enough is enough. Ukraine as a part of USSR got its own parlament in 1918, what about North Ireland? What about other parts of British empire?
You, stupid brits, just now, after 50 years of the death of Stalin, gave political rights to your minoritiies.
You do not know nothing. You cannot provide any facts. All you know is old cold war era cliches.
Posted by: Mikhail Mayorov | May 15th, 2008 at 11:12 pm | Report this commentMy native Romania was probably in today’s Russia shoes in 1990 and I’d like to think that Russia will too find its way to even more democratic standards. So without embellishing Russia’s efforts to catch on with its ex-satellites, I will use my rusty Russian in deciphering the location of the aforementioned monument. Pionerskaya is without doubt the Street of the Pioneers. Pioneers were the Communist scouts. I remember it well: I was in the first generation to loose the red Pioneer scarve, worn before me by my father and by millions of children aged 8-14, ever since the Stalinist Russian ‘liberation’. I am quite sure that, in post-Communist Romania, no street had kept such a name past January 1990. And Sverdlova? Sverdlov’s Street? Could he be the first leader of the Russian Socialist Republic, believed to hold a leading part in the October Revolution and the assassination of the Imerial family? Again, this is not meant to patronize Russians in choices of street names, but on a street name like that, a Gulag memorial seems a half-baked try.
Posted by: Luci Sandor | May 16th, 2008 at 1:20 am | Report this commentThe “internal dynamic” of citizens not always leads to democratic changes. It is very simple to hope that on one beautiful day Russian middle class will push the country towards reforms. But I’m afraid it’s a miracle.
Posted by: Tetyana Vysotska | May 16th, 2008 at 1:40 pm | Report this commentYou might notice that even such a great event as Orange Revolution in Ukraine was – unfortunately – not followed by significant reforms and democracy growth. Ukrainian people just became more politically indifferent and a lot of them will never trust to the politicians.
A partial answer, Vlad, is that the EU is an economic grouping of nation states, with agreed policies on trading, commercial and many social matters, which are more or less commonly applied in each member state.
So, whilst - as Tony Barber reports - Russia will seek to exploit the differences in views between members, the intention is to work together, and to trade as a bloc. It isn’t a question of Russia needing to deal with one state in order to stay friendly with another, as you propose. On some matters - eg gas pipelines - where the “customer” is the EU as a trading bloc, then Russia should deal with the EU. But they won’t, because that would mean giving away some of their undoubted political ‘clout’.
Gustav, even Robert Gates now recognises that when dealing with ‘machos’ it’s best to “sit down and talk to these guys”. Talk may only be “words” but they can and do have an effect. And note, I am not proposing an ‘appeasing’ or ’submissive’ approach, nor yet an ‘aggressive’ approach, but a clearly ‘assertive’ approach. That means standing up for your own rights whilst not violating the rights of the other party. Sadly, not many state leaders know how to be assertive, it seems.
Posted by: derek tunnicliffe | May 16th, 2008 at 4:46 pm | Report this comment1) Siberia has a lot of minerals,oil and gas in very hard conditions as do Norway,Canada,Alaska ,Iceland and Greenland,rational people get to work on it, TOGETHER, incompetent leaders argue forever, with hundreds of millions of humans unable to eat, to cook, to farm, to feed their children, talk of “cold war” and confrontation is equal to genocide,what we need is more exploration in the North (saving the whales and the polar bears ) while crops get started in the South.
2) we need leaders that will push Solar,Wind and Hybrid Batteries as well as sugar-cane/biomass/seaweed/jathropa/rapeseed ethanol and biofuels , and while we find a way for Hydrogen Fuel-Cells ,Electricity Storage and Fusion Ignition to be available in volume, that’s what the resources of Russia ,Europe and the Americas must make a reality, right now !
3) it’s very sad to see the Media refusing to tell the whole story about the abuses and theft by the oligarchs in the 90’s of the Russian Treasury, how some operators got billions of euros in stock and titles of oil,gas, airlines, land, minerals, harbors, transports and gas lines, companies,etc., for a few thousand dollars each from corrupt soviet bourocrats with no legal authority to sell that Russian Patrimony , it was the Boston Tea Party all over again, and no one has the strenght in the Western Media to tell it like it is, what a shame !
4) Take Hydrogen Fuel Cells , if we know from the latest financial reports that it costs 5 to 12 billion dollars to open a nuclear plant, why not get all of “them countries above together” and build the Mother of all Fuel Cells using seawater to extract Hydrogen ? what are we waiting for ? ….most likely , the Asians will do it sooner, again…
Posted by: blogger | May 16th, 2008 at 10:18 pm | Report this comment‘You know Tony, even under Stalin iron fist rules, there were more Democracy and Human rights than in your united kingdom. All of soviet republics had his own goverment, women and minorities enojed such rights which your people got only in 1960s. So enough is enough. Ukraine as a part of USSR got its own parlament in 1918, what about North Ireland? What about other parts of British empire?’
Mr. Mayorov, I think we are all well aware that there is a difference between simply possesing one’s own parliament, and having a functioning, transparent, independent democratic system. By the same token we can wonder why the Polish were not happy when Stalin so graciously, so benevolently, absolved them of the chore of running a fair election in 1947, and rendered Mikolajczyk and the London Poles useless. Perish the thought that a territory shamelessly ingested by the Soviet army would want to exercise their rights to freedom from foreign oppression.
Secondly, Northern Ireland got its own executive in 1920, under the Government of Ireland Act. The majority of Northern Irish voters also backed an exit out of the Irish Free State, and strong links with the Union. Perhaps you meant the Irish Republic?
At least Britain has wholly pulled out of its colonial territories, whereas Russia, in a strangely maternal and surrpetitous manner, seems to think it acceptable to involve itself in the affairs of ex-territories of the Soviet Union to this day. Stones and glass houses come to mind.
Posted by: Pilsud | May 18th, 2008 at 5:22 pm | Report this commentFollowing after Kosovo and Abkhazia should receive independence and Northern Ireland!
Trying to resist England certainly it is necessary to exclude from G8.
Posted by: LuckyBarker | May 20th, 2008 at 10:25 am | Report this commentAlas…
“When you can’t make an omelet without breaking eggs “
It seems relations between the EU and Russia have not improved as much as they could have since the end of the cold war. Many here still seem to hold anger towards one another. Yet for all this rhetoric, we need to let common sense win the day, by understanding that there is only only road that will lead to prosperity and peace, and that is through cooperation.
Posted by: Simon | May 20th, 2008 at 12:12 pm | Report this commentRussia has the potential to become a great country, and I truly hope they once again take up their deserved role in the world stage, however I hope that this time they become great by working with not against the west. Aggression between us with not achieve anything.
It appears that a new age in the world is dawning, an age where there will be huge shift (sharing) of power throughout the world and rightly so. What this will result in I do not know, but I do know that it has the potential to create a period where the majority of people (all over the world) will benefit. I only hope that those who are tolerant and open minded lead us towards that future
Past actions are there in the historical record. However, I do believe that it is not a case of national antagonism - simply that the Russian government does not do a very good job of reflecting the moderate element of its electorate. The reason why Putin and his ilk have caused concern is because there is no need for Cold War feelings to return to political discourse. The average European has no negative feelings towards Russians as Russians; perhaps in certain cases there is a slight resenment of what their government appears to represent.
There is great potential for cooperation with the Russian nation - their political leaders simply have to realise that if everything the Europeans do is interpreted as an aggressive move, nobody is going to make any progress at all. Also, they must accept that there is a generation which has a right to resent Russian actions in the past. This does not mean that we cannot both accept the past and work towards the future.
Posted by: Pilsud | May 20th, 2008 at 12:43 pm | Report this comment