The presidential election is still 6 months away, but speculation about who would stand i.e become president had reached fever pitch. A section of society really hoped that Medvedev would continue his liberal policies, even though signs that this could happen were few and far between. Now there is
Putin’s recent announcement that he would be “standing for” president caught people off guard, as it was intended to. For Andrei Piontkovsky, it was a disgusting spectacle and test of the Russian people that will almost certainly end badly.
The resignation of Russia's finance minister Aleksey Kudrin is a much more significant event than the Putin-Medvedev reshuffle, says Dmitry Travin. Kudrin's cool foresight was the driving force behind Russia’s economic resurgence of the early 2000s, and the main reason why the country avoided tota
The Russian election campaign is hotting up. In the middle of September Mikhail Prokhorov was dismissed as leader of the ‘Right Cause’ party, having fallen foul of both the party members and the Kremlin. This sets the context to an even bigger drama, and could be seen as the first stage of it. Ric
Russia’s strongman Vladimir Putin has decided that the time has come for him to return to Kremlin. oD Russia author Dmitri Travin is a native of Putin's home city of St Petersburg, and is well familiar with the conditions which shaped the Russian leader's mentality. The following article was origi
Latvia has been plagued by both deep recession and fractious relations with its large Russian-speaking minority. But with the economy now recovering fast, Andrew Wilson believes the country is creeping under the radar and off the well-worn postcommunist map.
Billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov’s appointment as leader of the pro-market liberal party ‘Right Cause’ was greeted with scepticism. Now he has effectively been dismissed and the party has split. Was this part of the original plan or was Prokhorov becoming a threat? Andrei Kolesnikov considers the rec
David Cameron’s Moscow “reset” resolved few of the fundamental issues afflicting UK-Russian relations. Yet by moving the relationship on beyond politics, the visit proved to be a rather useful one, writes Dmitri Trenin.
Mintimer Shaimiyev served in the government of Tatarstan during Soviet times (1969-91) and was subsequently President of the republic for nearly 20 years. Oleg Pavlov talked to him about the past, the present and the future of his republic, and of Russia.
The parliamentary election has been called for 4 December and the jockeying for position among the opposition parties will doubtless increase as politicians return refreshed from their holidays. How can those outside the system have any effect at all on the outcome? Grigorii Golosov considers some
The Black Sea republic of Abkhazia has elected its third president since securing effective independence from Georgia in 1993. The tiny country faces economic and social difficulties, in part deriving from its lack of international recognition. But its democratic experience deserves more attention
News of the English riots and looting was greeted variously in countries around the world. In Russia, many ordinary Russians were shocked and horrified, but there were also some complacent smiles at the “stupidity” of political correctness and multiculturalism, explains Andrei Ostalsky
