Category: Russian Federation

  • Cooperation and Confrontation between the USA and Russia in Caspian Region

    Cooperation and Confrontation between the USA and Russia in Caspian Region

    New monopolar world system had created new interests which depend on big powers in Caspian region after the collapse of Soviet Union. This situation shared a chaos on governmental system in this area. Big powers created a competition with Caspian Sea status and energy subjects to use their interests. Dominant power of the USA and Russia shared some conflict and cooperation circumstances as interdependent body in their relations. Particularly common threat position establishes cooperational theme. Caspian region which is second big energy sphere is a bridge between Europea and Asia, also it is a main point of the world domination conditions.

     

    Subjects of Confrontation and Hegemony Tools

     

    Big powers need conflict, cooperation and hard-soft balance tools as political subjects to increase their activity in the region. The USA and Russia have enough advantages according to their situation. But confrontation of powers can be transformed to common interest activities so to analyse foreign politics of states can provide to know near future. Today anxieties of the USA’s foreign affairs to Russia are existing as these subjects:

     

    – Monopoly situation of Russia in energy area,

    – Against position of Russia to NATO enlargement,

    – Russian force to Georgia,

    – Possibility of same circumstances to post-Soviet states by Russia,

    – Against position to Western initiatives about Iranian nuclear system.

     

             The USA used soft balance politics to Saudi Arabia and forced in Iraq to control Middle East which is first big oil sphere in the world. The USA supported first energy sharing agreement BTC in 1994 and for saving energy corridor it founded GUAM to be against CIS organisation about the subject of influence to Central Asia. The USA which a country had acted firstly in energy line plans to establish new cooperations to be dominant power in the region. American supported regional organisation GUAM targets new cooperations with West and to solve regional conflicts with Europen initiated projects. Also GUAM organised first military operations which Russia didn’t join. But Russia created a dilemma over the European energy corridor target of this organisation. Russia works to establish alternative energy lines and coordinate near abroad countries to common aims.

             Russia had an advantage to pressure over the post-Soviet states with energy event. Middle Asian countries which have big energy resources provide energy transportation via Russian territory. External projects are American supported issues. Shortly there is a competition that energy is used as a weapon.

     

             The USA interfered Afghanistan after the 11 September terrorist attack by this way the super power took a strategic point in Middle Asia. The USA shared a dangerous position for Russia because of the USA founded military points in Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzistan after the Afghanistan intervene. So Russia organised Shangai Cooperation Organisation to build an alternative body against the USA with other regional states. It shares a bandwagoning system for this region which had been established by Russia as a main actor.[1] By this way Russia that is a main state of CIS shared strong resist against the USA with its initiatives.

     

             Bilateral agreements in NATO circle with the USA of Caspian states formed a dependent system to West. In this subject Georgia had been a pro-American arena in this region.[2] On the other hand Azerbaijani and American relations increased after annuling 907. article in the USA that has supporting event to South Caucasus states without Azerbaijan. Russia and Iran speeched as against the USA after opened airspace of Azerbaijan to the USA. Additionally security of BTC is important to the USA. New American forces in Romania and Bulgaria can intervene Caucasus area if there is a problem in Baku Ceyhan pipeline. Also American soldiers in Georgia can be used in emergency circumstances.[3]

            

             Russia said possible intervenes of Collective Security Cooperation of Shangai Cooperation Organisation to NATO’s activities in this region as against the military activation of NATO. Other advantages of Russia are conflict events as without regional cooperations against NATO. Fergana, Osetia, Abkhazia and Karabakh issues give chances to Russian invasion on the region. Because solutions can be producted by Russian mediator situation. Otherwise western initiated organisation GUAM targets that solutions can be existed without Russia. Nobody can guarantee that Russia will not save its interests about regional conflicts in Ukraine-Crimea, Moldova-Transdiester, Azerbaijan-Karabakh as additionally Georgian conflicts. For this moment Russian conflict politics focused on Georgia in South Caucasus area. Abkhazia and Osetia problems are punishments to Georgia by Russia because of Georgian new Western oriented politics.

            

             Bandwagoning countries rejected American activities after 2004. These countries supported Russian decisions against to the USA after this date. European Union continued its enlargement politics in Caspian as paralel to American issues. Caspian states easily can depend on West with some projects like Nabucco. Specially European Union projects TACIS, INOGATE[4] and TRACECA[5] can create influence over the regional countries like other cooperational acts. New resist of Caspian states’ outlook shares itself as internal cooperation and contr-politics of Russia. Also America can take an advantage in Caspian status problem against to Russia.

            

                Obligatory Cooperations in the Region

     

             There is no possible way to fight new movements’ expansion in the region of Russia which is a problem of American foreign affairs. Struggle to terrorism that is in directly Iraq, Iran and Afghanistan is a main aim of the USA political issue in Middle Asia. There is a Russian anxiety about results of possible conflict between the USA and Iran. Additionally Russia doesn’t want cooperations of these countries[6];

    – Iran can buy weapons and nuclear technology from the USA,

    – The USA can approve oil and gas transportation via Iran as alternative to Russia in Caspian sphere,

    – The USA won’t need Russian support in struggle against Iran issue.

            

             The USA is a main power about struggle to terrorist movements in this region. Also Russia trusts this power in this subject and main result of that is American military foundation by permission of Russia. There is a new progress to decrease American influence in Manas military point’s closing process. But it can be a start line of enlargement terrorist activations which is Russia’s afraid. There is a different situation in East Europea initiative of the USA about military approach. It shares an interdependent relation among great powers. President Bush again gave his assurance that the proposed American missile shield was not aimed at Russia. NATO summit in Bucharest, Russia scored a partial victory on the question of expanding the alliance. NATO did not invite Ukraine and Georgia, both former Soviet states, onto its Membership Action Plan.[7]

     

             At the present time in which cold war rivalry is waking up, Caspian region is becoming a field of  conflict at the same time a collaboration in view of energy resources and military cooperation to activate grand forces’ sovereignty. Cooperation needs occured by common benefits cause means used to reduce another one’s activity. In this backgroung that power balances are occured outside the states of Middle Asia, bandwagoning countries which got free of being unrelated to others may cause new situations. Of course all the same, political declinations, which work directed by Mackinder’s Heartland Theory, have the ability to form new balances in this region. Athority of the region countries which have rich resources will indicate that the world will being run by how many poles.

     


    [1] Walt, Stephen M. (1987). The Origins of Alliances. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press

    [2] Klare Michael T., “Transforming the American Military into a Global Oil-Protection Service”

    [3] Purtaş Fırat, TÜRKSAM, “Hazar Bölgesinde Rekabetin Yeni Boyutu: Silahlanma Yarışı”

    [4] There are at present 21 countries which have acceded to this agreement with the EU (Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bulgaria, Croatia, Georgia, Greece, Kazakhstan, Kyrgisztan, Latvia, Macedonia, Moldova, Romania, Slovakia, Tajikistan, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Ukraine and the Republic of Serbia).Thus, all of them have agreed to cooperate towards the establishment of one or several systems of oil and gas pipelines which pass through their territories, while observing the jointly accepted rules embodied in the agreement.

    [5] Saraç Naciye, AZSAM “Tarihi İpek Yolu Yeniden Hayata Döndürülüyor”

    [6] Prof. Dr. Mark Katz, “The Role of Iran and Afghanistan in US-Russian Relations”

    [7] “Bush and Putin’s bittersweet farewell”, 06.04.2008

    Mehmet Fatih OZTARSU

    Baku Qafqaz University

    International Relations

  • Putin: Russia becomes Turkey’s leading economic partner

    Putin: Russia becomes Turkey’s leading economic partner

    sezerputinMOSCOW, May 16 (Xinhua) — Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said on Saturday that his country has become Turkey’s leading trade partner.

    Trade turnover between Russia and Turkey reached a record 35 billion U.S. dollars, making Russia one of the most important trade and economic partners of Turkey, Putin said during talks with his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the Black Searesort of Sochi.

    The heads of government hailed the cooperation between the two countries. “If several years ago we talked mostly about cooperation in the construction sector, now diversification is very broad,” Putin was quoted as saying by the Itar-Tass news agency.

    The premiers agreed to immediately start talks on extending two agreements under which Russia delivered natural gas to Turkey, the third largest consumer of Russian gas after Germany and Italy. Meanwhile, Russian companies are expected to participate in building four nuclear power plants in Turkey.

    Erdogan told reporters after their meeting that Putin would visit Turkey soon.

    Editor: Mu Xuequan

    Source:  news.xinhuanet.com, 17.05.2009

  • Activist Detained After Urging Tatarstan’s Independence

    Activist Detained After Urging Tatarstan’s Independence

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    Fauzia Bayramova

    An investigation has been launched against a prominent Tatar activist in the city of Chally, RFE/RL’s Tatar-Bashkir Service reports.

    Fauzia Bayramova — the leader of the self-proclaimed Milli Mejilis, a pan-Tatar parliament — was brought to police on her arrival from Turkey on May 20.

    She told RFE/RL that police asked her to sign a written pledge not to leave the city.

    Earlier this year, Russian federal officials accused Milli Mejilis activists of igniting interethnic hatred after they appealed for international recognition for an independent Tatarstan.

    Bayramova told RFE/RL that “since Russia recognized Abkhazia and South Ossetia as independent states, Tatarstan has a legitimate right to follow the same path.”

    She attended a panel discussion in Ankara last week on the state of democracy in Tatarstan and Bashkortostan.

    Participants at the discussion harshly criticized Russian authorities for violating Tatars’ political and cultural rights.

    Bayramova says it is possible that new accusations will soon be filed against her.

    https://www.rferl.org/a/Activist_Detained_After_Urging_Tatarstans_Independence/1736649.html

  • South Stream Gets a Boost

    South Stream Gets a Boost

    Business Week
    May 18, 2009
    Gas Pipelines: South Stream Gets a Boost
    Key countries sign on to Russia’s South Stream project, giving it an edge over the rival Nabucco pipeline proposal in a race with geopolitical repercussions
    By Jason Bush

    On May 15, Russia signed deals with Italy, Serbia, Bulgaria, and Greece, bringing the South Stream project, a major new gas pipeline to Europe, one step closer to reality.

    At a meeting in Sochi, attended by Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, Russia’s Gazprom (GAZP.RTS) and Italy’s ENI (ENI.MI) agreed to double the planned pipeline’s capacity to 63 billion cubic meters. In addition to ENI, Gazprom signed memoranda of understanding with Greek natural gas transmission company DESFA, Serbia’s Srbijagas, and Bulgarian Energy Holding.

    The participating countries also signed documents needed to start work on the 2,000km (1,243-mile) pipeline. With completion planned by 2015, South Stream eventually will pump natural gas from southern Russia under the Black Sea, bringing it via Bulgaria, Serbia, Hungary, and Greece to terminals in western Austria and southern Italy.

    The agreement represents a significant diplomatic coup for Russia in a great geopolitical race that will help determine the source of Europe’s energy supplies for decades to come. That race has been visibly gaining pace over recent weeks. Backers of a rival pipeline to southern Europe are now vying to put together the necessary political support. “It’s very much down to the wire now,” says Chris Weafer, chief strategist at UralSib (USBN.RTS), a Moscow bank. “There’s definitely a race on to get all the signatures in place.”

    Concerns About a Stranglehold

    It’s no coincidence that the agreements on South Stream come just days after a key summit in Prague designed to give political impetus to Nabucco, a proposed rival pipeline through Turkey that is backed by the European Commission and the U.S. In the eyes of the EU and the U.S., the key advantage of Nabucco is that it would bypass Russia, diminishing Europe’s already heavy dependence on Russian gas. Imports from Russia presently account for around 40% of gas imports and 25% of gas consumption in Europe. Concerns about Russia’s stranglehold on Europe’s energy have only intensified recently, following this January’s damaging price spat between Russia and Ukraine, which briefly saw Russia’s gas supplies to Europe suspended.

    Those fears help explain the recent burst of activity surrounding Nabucco, a project that has been under discussion since 2002. In addition to the Prague summit, the EU has also been busy courting Turkey, a key transit country, which is expected to sign an agreement in June paving the way for Turkey to host the pipeline. Previously, there had been concerns that Turkey would try to use the pipeline as a bargaining chip in EU accession negotiations.

    But despite the recent progress on Nabucco, it all still looks to many analysts like a case of too little, too late. “I believe Nabucco still looks very problematic,” says Jonathan Stern, director of gas research at the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies. “It might work, or it might not, but I don’t think it’s going to work quickly.” He argues that the pipeline probably won’t be viable until around 2020­much later than the 2014 starting date currently being advanced.

    It doesn’t help that Russia, eager to safeguard its dominant position as Europe’s energy supplier, is already one step ahead of the game. The agreements reached in Sochi underscore Russia’s success in winning over key customers and transit countries for South Stream­a project that contradicts the EU’s stated policy of diversifying Europe’s energy supplies.

    Where to Get the Gas

    Even without the competition from South Stream, major question marks continue to hang over the whole economic viability of the Nabucco project. One key problem is financing: So far the EU has only committed a small fraction of the €7.9 billion ($10.6 billion) needed to build the pipeline. An even more basic question is where the gas for Nabucco (ultimately targeted at 31 billion cubic meters per annum) will come from.

    The original idea behind the pipeline was to ship gas from the Caspian region and Central Asia, with gas-rich countries such as Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan supplying the fuel. The snag is that of these four countries, only Azerbaijan signed up to the Prague agreement backing the project.

    The other three Central Asian countries, under diplomatic pressure from Russia, pointedly declined to do so. In any case, no one has figured out how Central Asian gas could be linked up with Nabucco. A pipeline under the Caspian is impossible until all the bordering states resolve a long-running dispute over the sea’s legal status, giving Russia an effective veto.

    Analysts therefore believe the only way Nabucco can be viable is if Iran can now be talked into supplying gas for the project­a scenario that the U.S. previously fought. And despite recent overtures from U.S. President Barack Obama to improve relations with Iran, it’s still far too soon to talk of any diplomatic thaw.

    Meanwhile, the Russians are making progress with South Stream, which currently appears to be the more economically viable of the two. In sharp contrast to Nabucco, the Russians have no shortage of gas that could potentially be transported to Europe via the pipe, and the Russians also seem committed to financing the project. “It’s expensive, controversial, and hard to implement,” says Valery Nesterov, oil and gas analyst at Russian investment bank Troika Dialog. “But at least it has investment guarantees, and a resource base, to be secured by Gazprom. Though not without problems, the financial guarantees and resource base are still more realistic than those secured by Nabucco.”

    Snail vs. Tortoise

    It’s far too early, though, to declare victory for the Russians. The South Stream project also faces many daunting obstacles. Indeed, the great pipeline race might be said to resemble a marathon contest between a snail and a tortoise. “At this stage, it’s not clear where the gas is going to come from for either route,” says UralSib’s Weafer.

    Although Russia has huge gas reserves that could potentially be shipped Europe’s way, most of those reserves are still sitting deep under the Arctic tundra, in the remote Yamal region of Northern Siberia. The cost of bringing them to market is gargantuan­around $250 billion, according to estimates by Royal Dutch Shell (RDSA). The current global recession has only increased the uncertainty about future gas demand, making Gazprom even more reluctant to invest. Russia and the EU have so far failed to hammer out legal agreements that would regulate joint ventures between Gazprom and Western partners. “It’s a real mess,” says Weafer.

    Then there’s the tremendous cost of the South Stream pipeline itself. Officially estimated at between €19 billion and €24 billion ($25.6 billion to $32.4 billion), it’s around three times as expensive as the alternative Nabucco route. Those costs could now be especially problematic, at a time when the global financial crisis is depressing gas prices and Gazprom’s profits. “Gazprom is facing financial difficulties in the years to come,” says Nesterov, “and the cost of the project is tremendous.”

    So despite South Stream’s diplomatic head start, the outcome of the great pipeline race is still far from certain. And neither pipeline is likely to provide any quick solution to Europe’s mounting long-term energy needs.

    Bush is BusinessWeek’s Moscow bureau chief.

  • Crimean Tatars On Deportation Anniversary

    Crimean Tatars On Deportation Anniversary

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    Crimean Tatars commemorate 65th anniversary of mass deportation in Simferopol.

    May 18, 2009

    SIMFEROPOL, Ukraine — At least 15,000 Crimean Tatars gathered in central Simferopol to mark the 65th anniversary of their deportation and to demand linguistic and political rights, RFE/RL’s Ukrainian Service reports.

    On May 18-20, 1944, the Soviet authorities deported some 200,000 Crimean Tatars to Central Asia, with nearly half of them dying en route.

    After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Crimean Tatars began returning en mass to the Crimea.

    The demonstrators in Simferopol held Ukrainian and Crimean Tatar national flags and called for schools to be established that teach in the Crimean Tatar language and for that language to receive official status on the peninsula.

    Crimean Tatar leader Mustafa Djemilev said that Crimean Tatars want Crimea to be an autonomous territory within Ukraine.

    He said some 280,000 Crimean Tatars currently live in Crimea and at least 150,000 more are planning to return to their ancestral lands.

    https://www.rferl.org/a/Crimean_Tatars_Demand_Language_Rights_On_Deportation_Anniversary/1734273.html

  • BAKU AND YEREVAN DOWNBEAT ON A POSSIBLE SOLUTION

    BAKU AND YEREVAN DOWNBEAT ON A POSSIBLE SOLUTION

    Shahin Abbasov and Gayane Abrahamyan 5/11/09

    While international mediators give an upbeat assessment to the May 8 tête-à-tête between Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, within Azerbaijan and Armenia there is a scarcity of optimism.

    Novruz Mammadov, head of the Azerbaijani presidential administration’s Foreign Policy Department, put it bluntly. “The [Minsk Group] co-chairs’ optimism does not correspond with reality,” Mammadov told ATV television on May 9. “The presidents’ meeting was unsuccessful.”

    Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov had earlier asserted that the Armenians “again did not show a constructive approach.” He did not elaborate.

    Yerevan cast the two leaders’ Prague meeting in somewhat of a more positive light. The talks with President Aliyev were “useful,” the Armenian presidential press service said in an official statement, since they “allowed the parties to further define approaches over the basic principles for the NK [Nagorno-Karabakh] conflict resolution, as well as to bring positions of the parties over some issues closer together.”

    In a May 8 interview with RFE/RL’s Azeri-language service, US Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Matthew Bryza, the Minsk Group’s American co-chair, asserted that Aliyev and Sargsyan now agree on the major concepts for how to resolve the Karabakh conflict. Details will be sorted out “during the upcoming two weeks,” Bryza said. “After that the whole concept [of resolution] should be quickly agreed. It is realistic by autumn of this year.”

    In a separate interview with the Ekho Moskvy radio station on May 11, Bryza had this to say (according to an unofficial translation): “In the end, the [occupied Azerbaijani] territories will be returned, and there will be, in addition, a return of Azerbaijani displaced persons to these territories.”

    “At present, I can’t predict what will be [the case] with Karabakh itself,” Bryza continued. “We know that it will have some kind of new status. How that status is defined … well, negotiations are still going on about that.”

    Armenian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Tigran Balaian, responding to Bryza’s Ekho Moskvy comments, said that “during the May 8 meeting in Prague, the issue of taking Armenian troops out of the disputed [occupied] territories was not discussed at all.”

    In an interview with Russia’s Ekho Moskvy radio station, French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner stated that “each side follows its own line and responds to the scenarios in a very different manner.” He added, however, that “there is no need to be disappointed.”

    One Azerbaijani analyst pinpoints a strategic reason for the mediators’ persistent optimism. “Turkey and the United States are hurrying to make progress on a Karabakh solution because they want to open the Armenian-Turkish border this year,” opined Elhan Shahinoglu, head of the Baku-based independent think-tank Atlas. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive]. “It is clear now that Ankara will not be able to open the border by separating this issue from the Nagorno-Karabkah talks. So progress is urgently needed.”

    The Prague talks took place against a background of unprecedented diplomatic activity. During the last month and a half, Turkey and Armenia agreed on a “road map” to reconciliation, presidents Aliyev and Sargsyan both paid visits to Moscow and US President Barack Obama visited Turkey, a key Azerbaijani ally.

    The pronouncements about progress worry one former Armenian foreign minister. “There has always been a limit to the compromise the Armenian side could afford, so the sides could not reach agreements when the Azerbaijani position did not fit within the framework acceptable to the Armenian side,” Vartan Oskanian, who served as foreign minister from 1998 to 2008, told the Armenian news site Yot Or in a May 8 interview. “What is it now that makes it possible to talk about an agreement? Is it because Azerbaijan has lowered the benchmark for its demands, or is it Armenia?”

    In Azerbaijan, ANS-TV quoted an unnamed government source as saying that Armenia had gotten tougher at the talks. Sargsyan, the source claimed, demanded that a date be set for a vote within Karabakh about the territory’s status in exchange for an Armenian withdrawal from five Azerbaijani regions bordering the territory. No mention of such a proposal has been made in Armenia.

    Within Karabakh itself worries are growing that the territory’s fate will be decided without its de facto government having a say in the matter. “No one can decide [Karabakhis’] fate sitting there, in Yerevan,” asserted the region’s former de facto defense minister, Samvel Babaian, at a May 9 news conference. “The people in Karabakh will not obey any decision when they feel danger. I am confident of it.”

    On May 9, President Sargsyan visited Karabakh, where he was born, and spoke with the region’s leader, Bako Sahakian. In remarks to reporters, Sahakian expressed confidence that Armenia is trying to have Karabakh included in the negotiations. Karabakh was represented in the talks until 1998. “[E]verybody realizes there can’t be any final decision without the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic’s participation,” Panorama.am reported Sahakian as saying.

    But if Karabakh’s future status becomes the sticking point, the chances for a breakthrough would appear even slimmer, added one Baku observer. “Azerbaijan is not ready for any compromise on this issue,” independent analyst Rasim Agayev told ANS TV on May 8.

    One Azerbaijani analyst argues that any future progress will depend on the results of revived dialogue between Russia and the United States. President Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedyev are scheduled to meet in July in Moscow. “If Moscow and Washington will agree on the wide spectrum of problems in US-Russian relations, I would expect a breakthrough at the Karabakh talks as early as the autumn,” commented Rauf Mirkadirov, political columnist for Baku’s Russian-language Zerkalo (Mirror) daily.

    Still, getting a clear grasp on how the Prague meeting will affect further talks poses a challenge, noted one Armenian analyst. “One needs to be at least a fortune-teller to judge [the future] from Bryza’s words,” said independent political expert Suren Aivazian.

     

    Editor’s Note: Shahin Abbasov is a freelance correspondent based in Baku. He is also a board member of the Open Society Institute-Azerbaijan. Gayane Abrahamyan is a reporter for ArmeniaNow.com in Yerevan.