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 Russian Officials, Media Said Ignoring Echoes of Kondopoga Vienna, September 29, 2006 – Just as the Russian government and Moscow media were almost a week late in covering the clashes in the Karelian city of Kondopoga a month ago, since that time, some Russian commentators say, both have played down the ethnic dimension of those clashes and the echoes of Kondopoga across the Russian Federation. more story...
Russian Blogosphere Growing by 100 Blogs Every Hour Vienna, September 29, 2006 – The Russian-language blogosphere, currently expanding at the rate of 100 new blogs every hour of every day, now
includes more than 1.15 million blogs on which their creators and
visitors have posted more than 80 million messages, according to a new
study of the Russian Internet. more story...
Some in Moscow Patriarchate Seek Orthodox-Catholic ‘Alliance’ Against Islam Vienna, September 29, 2006 – Despite President Vladimir Putin’s bow to anti-Catholic sentiments among many Russians and repeated repeated calls by Patriarch Aleksii II for Muslim-Orthodox concord, senior churchmen within the Patriarchate itself are pursuing an Orthodox-Catholic alliance against Islam, according to a leading Russian historian. more story...
Moscow Pays High Price for Its ‘Special Role’ in Central Asia Vienna, September 28, 2006 – The Russian government is paying a high and rising price for international recognition of its “special role” in Central Asia because of three trends among the five post-Soviet states there that it has generally chosen to ignore, according to a journalist who writes frequently on Russian-Central Asian relations. more story...
The Spectre of Lustration Again Haunts Russian Politics Vienna, September 28, 2006 – After the collapse of communism, many in both the post-Soviet states and the former Soviet bloc called for
lustration, the exclusion from government activities of all those who had served in senior positions of the Communist Party or the security agencies of the old regime. more story...
Chubais Says Lack of National Idea Behind Russia’s Ethnic Conflicts Vienna, September 28, 2006 – The current upsurge of ethnic conflicts in the Russian Federation is the result of the country’s lack of a “national idea capable of unifying people,” according to Igor Chubais, head of the Moscow Center for the Study of Russia and brother of Russia's privatization chief in the 1990s. more story...
Social Problems, Official Corruption Behind Kondopoga Clashes, Russians Say Vienna, September 27, 2006 – After Kondopoga, only one Russian in five favors adopting the kind of radical measures against migrants advocated by Russian nationalist groups, according to a new poll, but one in two believe the country needs to deal with social problems and official corruption if it is to avoid such clashes in the future. more story...
Russian Society Between Assimilation and Multiculturalism, Scholar Says Vienna, September 27, 2006 – In dealing with immigrants and ethnic minorities, the post-Soviet Russian Federation has not adopted either of the two approaches used elsewhere -- assimilation as in France or multiculturalism as in Canada, according to Moscow’s leadingethno-sociologist. more story...
Russia’s Northern Peoples Again Look Abroad for Policy Ideas Vienna, September 27, 2006 – Members of the numerically small peoples of the Russian Arctic, groups who continue to be disproportionately victims of central government policies, are one again turning their attention to the arrangements Northern peoples in other countries have made with their governments in order to survive in the 21st century. more story...
Moscow Must Promote ‘Sovereign Democracy,’ Analyst Says Vienna, September 6, 2006 – Russia must make “sovereign democracy” the centerpiece of its ideology and policy both at home and abroad or face the prospect that outsiders will continue to impose their ideas about what Russian democracy consists of and what role Moscow should play in the world, according to a leading Moscow political commentator. more story...
Dalai Lama Sees Russia’s Buddhists Helping Tibetan Faith Survive Vienna, September 5, 2006 – The Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of the world’s Buddhists, says that because of conditions in his homeland, “Mongolia and Buddhist Russia will play the predominant role” in the preservation and growth of Tibetan Buddhism in the future. more story...
French Minority Policies Show Moscow What Not to Do, Muslims Say Vienna, September 6, 2006 – France, “one of the few countries of the world which does not recognize ethnic minorities officially,” offers some important, if largely negative, lessons to Moscow and the minorities of the Russian Federation, according to a group of Muslim analysts in Nizhniy Novgorod. more story...
Antagonism Between Muscovites, Other Russians Said Declining Vienna, September 5, 2006 – Relations between Muscovites and residents of other regions of the Russian Federation have never been entirely easy, with many of the former looking down on the latter and many of the latter put off by the attitudes of the residents of the country’s capital. more story...
Voronezh Teachers Told to Track ‘Extremists’ in Early Grades Vienna, September 5, 2006 – Police officials in Voronezh have told teachers in that city’s primary schools that they need to identify and report on pupils involved in potentially extremist informal organizations,
according to a report in yesterday’s “Nezavisimaya gazeta.” more story...
Russians Near World’s Largest Lake May Soon Be Drinking Bottled Water Vienna, September 5, 2006 – In a story which echoes the Soviet-era joke that Saudi Arabia, were it ever to go communist, would then be forced to import sand, an Irkutsk newspaper reports this week that residents in the area around Lake Baikal, the world’s largest lake (by volume), may soon have to buy bottled water to drink. more story...
Clashes in Karelian City Said to be a Wake Up Call for Russia Vienna, September 4, 2006 – Clashes over the last week between Russians and immigrants from the Caucasus in the Karelian city of Kondopoga which have left at least three dead, many injured or detained, and some property destroyed and on which Moscow sought to impose a news blockade until yesterday must be a wake up call for Russia. more story...
Moscow’s Efforts to Play Islamic Card Said Likely to Backfire Vienna, September 4, 2006 – The Russian government’s efforts to win favor in the Islamic world by providing arms to Iran and Sudan, meeting with the leader of Hamas, and denouncing Israeli’s actions against
Hezbollah not only are unlikely to work in the way Moscow hopes but are certain to backfire against Russia in the future. more story...
Kremlin Fails to Recognise Young Russians Are Not Soviet People Vienna, September 4, 2004 – The Kremlin has failed to recognize that young Russians who have grown up since 1991 are fundamentally different than their elders who grew up in Soviet times, and as a result, it has adopted policies that have divided those in power from the people who should be its most natural supporters. more story...
Extremist Russian Website Calls for Reprisals Against Rights Activists Vienna, September 1, 2006 – An extremist Russian website has called for physical reprisals against a list human rights activists --and even provided those who might carry such attacks out with photographs and other details about those it would like to see attacked, according to a group of Chechen rights activists living outside of Russia. more story...
Russian Orthodox Say Non-Christians Must Study Orthodoxy Vienna, September 1, 2006 – The increasingly successful efforts of the Russian Orthodox Church to make the study of the Foundations of
Orthodoxy a compulsory subject in Russian schools even for non-Christians is generating a backlash among Muslims and has sparked a debate over the proper relationship of state and church. more story...
Russian Supreme Court Refuses to Block Demolition of Astrakhan Mosque Vienna, September 1, 2006 – The Russian Federation Supreme Court has rejected an appeal by members of the Muslim community of Astrakhan against orders from the city government there to tear down a mosque they had built not only with the approval but the support of the previous city government. more story...
Russians Risk ‘National Suicide’ by Turning Away from Traditions Vienna, August 31, 2006 – According to the scholar who helped to develop President Vladimir Putin’s new demographic program, the Russian nation and consequently the Russian state as well risk committing a kind of collective suicide if they continue to turn away from their national traditions. more story...
Rural Share of Russian Population on the Rise Vienna, August 31, 2006 – The percentage of Russians living in rural areas is on the increase -- but not because of an increase in the birthrate
there or the return of urban residents to the countryside. Instead, it
reflects continuing population declines in Russian cities and the
reclassification of some small cities that have lost population as
rural areas. more story...
Russia’s Muslims Need to Open ‘Gates of Interpretation’ on Organizational Issues Vienna, August 31, 2006 – Like their fellow believers elsewhere, Russia’s Muslims have no need to open “the gates of interpretation” (“ijtihad”) on fundamental questions of faith, according to a leading Islamic commentator. But if they are to be true to their beliefs, they must reopen those gates on organizational and communications questions. more story...
Drafting Village Teachers Seen Sealing Fate of Rural Russia Vienna, August 30, 2006 – The Russian government’s plan to end draft deferments for those serving as teachers in rural schools, a program
that will yield only about 2,000 new soldiers each year, will contribute
to the dying out of many rural areas of the Russian Federation, according to a leading Moscow specialist. more story...
Russia’s Muslims Urged to Unite to Block Orthodox Offensive Vienna, August 30, 2006 – Russia’s Muslims must come together in a single institution in order to be in a position to block Orthodox Church’s unconstitutional and potentially extremely dangerous efforts to dominate the country’s public schools, its military and security services, and its penal institutions, according to the mufti in Krasnoyarsk kray. more story...
Putin Regime Again Positioning Itself as ‘Lesser Evil’ Vienna, August 30, 2006 – Moscow media efforts to play up the rise of Russian fascism are designed to make a third term for President Vladimir Putin appear to be “the lesser evil,” according to a leading Russian nationalist commentator in an article published in a Siberian newspaper today. more story...
Kremlin Scored for Failing to Focus on Dangers from Radical Right Vienna, August 29, 2006 – Post-Soviet Russian leaders have failed to focus on the dangers presented by radical right, in the 1990s because they had a greater fear of a revival of left-wing radicalism and now because many leaders do not themselves have “immunity” to this “virus,” according to a leading Moscow analyst. more story...
Putin Plenopotentiary Calls for Expanding Muslim Training System Vienna, August 29, 2006 – Aleksandr Konovalov, the Presidential plenopotentiary representative in the Volga Federation District, said earlier this month that he and the Russian government would like to see a dramatic expansion in schools training Muslim leaders and are
prepared to do what they can to help make that possible. more story...
Soviet-Style ‘Punitive’ Psychiatry Reappears in Russia Vienna, August 29, 2006 – Russian prosecutors are reviving a discredited practice of the Soviet past -- the use of psychiatric expertise for political purposes – but now as part of a broader effort to find a
justification for banning Islamic texts that officials view as
incitements to terrorist violence. more story...
Gorbachev’s Policies Threatened to Dismember Russian Federation Vienna, August 28, 2006 -- Mikhail Gorbachev pursued policies that, save for the August 1991 putsch and the actions of Boris Yeltsin, could have led to a smaller Muslim-dominated USSR, the rise of Nursultan Nazarbayev as its leader, and the disintegration of the Russian Federation, according to a leading specialist on separatism there. more story...
Kaliningraders Oppose New Immigrants – Even If They’re Russian Vienna, August 28, 2006 – Two out of every three current residents of Kaliningrad say they oppose any new wave of immigration, even if it consists only of ethnic Russians whom the governor of that
non-contiguous Russian exclave has invited from the former Soviet
republics and Baltic states. more story...
Is Russian Opposition to Expansion of Mosque Actually Growing? Vienna, August 28, 2006 – More than 10,000 Russians have signed an Internet petition against the refurbishment and expansion of Moscow’s Cathedral Mosque, but at least one Muslim leader believes that many of these are made-up names and reflect not popular attitudes but “a planned provocation” by unnamed anti-Muslim forces. more story...
Russia’s Human Rights Community Denounced for ‘Seven Sins’ Vienna, August 25, 2006 – Human rights activists in the Russian Federation have only themselves to blame for their declining influence in broader society and the crisis in which their community finds itself, according to a commentary published this week in a leading Moscow business newspaper. more story...
Russia’s Muslims Recapitulate Pre-1917 Developments Vienna, August 25, 2006 – The Muslim community (“umma”) of the Russian Federation is recapitulating many of the developments – organizational, ideological, and political -- of its predecessor at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries, according to a leading Russian specialist on the recent history of Islam in Eurasia. more story...
Younger Russians More Skeptical Than Elders About Country’s Direction Vienna, August 25, 2006 – Over the last six years, younger Russians have become increasingly skeptical about the direction the Russian Federation is heading in, while those slightly older have become somewhat more optimistic about that trend, according to the results of polling released this week. more story...
"Are There Any ‘Russians’ in the Near Abroad?" A Kazakh Asks Vienna, August 24, 2006 – With Moscow’s backing, the Russian community in Kazakhstan is stepping up its demands for special treatment, calls that have prompted one Kazakh analyst to question whether Russian speakers there now constitute a distinct ethnic community and whether Moscow has a right to pose as their defender. more story...
1993 Constitution Blamed for Russia’s Leadership Problems Vienna, August 24, 2006 – The Russian Constitution adopted in December 1993 is to blame for Russia’s current leadership problems not because it limits President Vladimir Putin to two terms but because its provisions have allowed both him and his government to ignore the will of the people, according to a leading Moscow analyst. more story...
Kremlin Plan to Unite Two Altai Territories Sparks Opposition Vienna, August 24, 2006 – Public organizations in the Altai Republic are
working to mobilize the population there against Moscow’s plans to
combine that national republic with the neighboring Altai kray and run
a pipeline through what many people in the region view as a sacred
region. more story...
1986 Chernobyl Disaster Blamed for Rise in Miscarriages in Russia Vienna, August 23, 2006 – Doctors in St. Petersburg and other Russian cities privately blame the “massive” rise in the number of miscarriages among 20-year-old Russian women on the April 1986 Chernobyl nuclear power plant disaster, even though government officials continue to deny or otherwise play down any such linkage. more story...
Water Conflicts in Central Asia Now ‘Out of Control,’ Analyst Says Vienna, August 23, 2006 – Conflicts over water among the five countries of Central Asia are “already out of control,” according to a leading commentator in that region. And as a result, there is an increasing likelihood that efforts to exploit possession of or gain access to water will trigger military conflicts among them in the future. more story...
Russia’s Muslims View Regional Policies in EU as Possible Models Vienna, August 23, 2006 – Muslim scholars in Nizhniy Novgorod are examining the regional and ethnic policies of European Union countries with an eye to incorporting that experience in their own political demands, the latest indication of the extent to which the EU is having an impact well beyond its own borders. more story...
‘Cultural Distance’ Between Russians, New Immigrants Increasing Vienna, August 22, 2006 – Immigrants arriving in the Russian Federation today are more likely than those who came a decade ago to drawn from non-Russian nationalities, come from smaller cities or rural areas, and have less education and fewer skills, according to a demographer at the Russian Academy of Sciences. more story...
Russian Federation Populace Already ‘a Single Nation,’ Tishkov Says Vienna, August 22, 2006 – The population of the Russian Federation is already “a single nation” [“natsiya”], according to Valeriy
Tishkov, a Moscow ethnographer with close ties to the Kremlin. And
consequently, the authorities there should promote “by all possible
means” a common but not ethnically based Russian [”rossiiskiy”]
nationalism. more story...
Russian Language Use Declining Inside Russia and Beyond Vienna, August 22, 2006 – Since the disintegration of the Soviet Union, the number of people speaking Russian actively or passively has declined by almost 20 percent, the largest fall of any major linguistic group during that period and one projected to continue in the future, according to demographers at the Russian Academy of Sciences. more story...
Culture, Not Cash Driving Demographic Trends in Russia Vienna, August 21, 2006 – Differences in continuing attachment to traditional culture explain far more of the variance in demographic behaviour among national groups in the Russian Federation than do variations in material well-being, according to a factor analysis of post-Soviet census data. more story...
Transnational Crime on the Rise in Russian Far East, Expert Says Vienna, August 21, 2006 – Organized crime, already widespread in the
Russian Far East, is not only growing stronger within that region but is
increasingly interlinked with criminal groups operating in the neighboring countries of China, Japan, and Korea, according to a leading Vladivostok specialist. more story...
Ethnic Russian Converts to Islam Turning Up in Terrorist Groups Vienna, August 21, 2006 – Although the total number of ethnic Russians who have converted to Islam in recent years is not large – certainly fewer than 20,000 – the participation of a small number of them in terrorist actions against Moscow is attracting ever more Russian media attention and concern. more story...
Many of Russia's Muslims Back Moscow on Hezbollah and HAMAS Vienna, August 2, 2006 – Muslims in the Russian Federation generally `back Moscow’s decision not to include Hezbollah and HAMAS on a list of
terrorist organizations, some because they support the programs of
these two groups but most because of deference to the government, according to an informal survey conducted by a Muslim news agency. more story...
Russian Democracy Must Reflect National Traditions, Metropolitan Kirill Insists Vienna, August 2, 2006 – Russian democracy, understood “in the first instance as the harmonization of interests,” must reflect the
specific features of the country’s history and culture or it will be rejected by the Russian people, according to one of the most senior hierarchs of the Moscow Patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church. more story...
Why ‘Islamism’ Remains a Taboo Term for Russian Elites Vienna, August 2, 2006 – Most of the leaders of Russia’s Muslim community and a significant share of that country’s political elite are reluctant to use the term “Islamism,” lest they be misunderstood by domestic and international audiences, according to a Russian political commentator. more story...
Russians Back Iran Against Israel and U.S., Retired General Says Vienna, August 1, 2006 – Leonid Ivashov, former deputy head of the Russian General Staff, told the Russian Service of the Voice of Iran that the majority of Russians and their elites back Iran in its disputes with Israel and the U.S., even though the Kremlin has to “maneuver” lest it offend Washington or members of the media elite in Moscow. more story...
Is Kremlin Behind Rap Group’s Ultra-Nationalist Lyrics? Vienna, August 1, 2006 – The unexpected appearance of ultra-nationalist lyrics in a new album by one of Russia’s leading rap music groups has raised suspicions that Kremlin political technologists may be attempting to exploit popular culture for political gain just as their Soviet-era predecessors did. more story...
A Russian ‘Paradox’ -- A Monastery Opens in a Closed City Vienna, August 1, 2006 – Patriarch Aleksii II this week opened a monastery in the closed city of Surov, better known by its Soviet-era designation as Arzamas-16, a location barred to outsiders where the Russian Federation has developed and continues to produce some of its most
advanced nuclear weapon systems. more story...
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