MOSCOW, May 8 (RIA Novosti)
Eastern Partnership to spur Russia-EU rivalry / Russia has no sure way to influence developments in Georgia / EU finds gas bypasses around Russia / Transdnestr wants to legalize Russian ruble on its territory /
Gazeta.ru
Eastern Partnership to spur Russia-EU rivalry
Last summer's war in the Caucasus and growing tensions in the energy sphere have effectively turned EU's Eastern Partnership program, a purely bureaucratic project, into an influential factor in European politics. It looks like Russia and the EU are back to open rivalry in the CIS, writes Fyodor Lukyanov, editor-in-chief of the Moscow-based magazine Russia in Global Affairs.
The need to involve former Soviet republics in the EU's sphere of influence, primarily for energy reasons, has proved more powerful than the precious European values Brussels is so fussy about.
Belarus is an eloquent example of the change. On the one hand, Brussels has pressured that country in a most obnoxious and unprecedented manner, desperate to prevent recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia as independent states. Admittedly, they needn't have bothered, since the Belarusian leader wasn't really going to do it anyway.
On the other hand, Brussels showed it was quite willing to pay with a substantial reduction of requirements, as most of the reasons why Europe was dissatisfied with Belarus's regime became "insignificant" in an instant, the analyst wrote.
Along with that, European politicians revived contacts with Turkmenistan, a country they had condemned only recently as lacking the very concept of human rights.
Apparently, one simply cannot stick to the image of a rigorist preaching high morals in a zone of historic geopolitical rivalry. Double standards aren't a luxury here; they're a must.
The EU's expansion to adjacent regions burdens Europe with a need to meddle in the complicated affairs of countries that happen to be "in between" and aggravates tensions with Moscow - as if Europe didn't have its plate full without.
However, instead of reaching some breakthrough agreements on fundamental principles of Russian-European relations which would take into account the concerns of those "in between" the hammer and the anvil, Europe has effectively made an attempt to build some political unity upon opposing Moscow, Lukyanov writes.
The EU's attempts to act as political patron of adjacent post-Soviet countries are in sharp contrast with its obvious political weakness. Europe certainly cannot fail to realize that, in the next few years (not months), all the Eastern Partnership Members as well as other post-Soviet countries will be little more than a royal pain in the neck, the analyst concluded.
Vedomosti
Russia has no sure way to influence developments in Georgia
Russia has no powerful means to influence developments in Georgia. The Georgian government has reported averting an attempt to stage a military coup, ostensibly plotted by Russia. However, it appears more likely that Mikheil Saakashvili simply tried to take advantage of a provocation to scuttle a possible rapprochement of his political opponents with several law enforcement and security chiefs dissatisfied with him.
On the one hand, the opposition, which has been long rallying in Tbilisi in vain, demonstratively refused to cooperate with the rebels. On the other hand, it would be logical to assume that the alleged revolt is connected with opposition activists' attempts to get in touch with the Georgian military - even President Saakashvili is known to have triumphed in the 2003 rose revolution thanks to the security forces' de facto neutrality. Therefore, the very attempt of such contact was supposed to bring about a harsh reaction from the government.
However, one should not rule out that these are so-called precautions, or simply a provocation, aimed at frustrating the opposition's possible negotiations with law enforcement and security chiefs.
Clearly, the Georgian government could not help accusing Russia of the rebellion, but then tensions somewhat defused after NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer lashed out at the Georgian government, saying that it should not entangle current NATO drills in Georgia in Russian-Georgian relations. All this said, it is not entirely obvious that Moscow needs President Saakashvili's overthrow right now.
One should admit that Russia lost powerful means to influence developments in Georgia long ago. Russia's support will only harm the Georgian opposition; more to the point, there are no influential pro-Russian politicians in Georgia. The opposition needs the West's support, which it seeks to receive by organizing a series of protests, but Western governments are now hardly concerned about regime change in Georgia.
Therefore, President Saakashvili has every chance to wait until opposition rallies are over to continue ruling Georgia, which diminished in size thanks to his efforts, remaining at the same time the main irritant to the Russian foreign policy.
Kommersant, Izvestia
EU finds gas bypasses around Russia
Participants in the Southern Corridor - New Silk Road summit in Prague to open on May 8 plan to sign a declaration on accelerated building of gas bypasses around Russia, which could ruin Russia's monopoly on gas shipments from Central Asia.
The participants of the Southern Corridor program include Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Egypt, Iraq and Turkey.
The draft joint declaration of the summit includes plans to design a bypass route to link European consumers with Caspian production facilities with the help of strategic infrastructure projects to ship natural gas by pipelines or tankers.
This primarily implies Turkmenistan, which Brussels sees as the key source to fill the Nabucco gas pipeline. Until recently, all of that country's gas was shipped to Europe across Russia by the Gazprom monopoly.
A recent gas conflict with Russia must have prodded Turkmenistan to join the Transcaspian project. In March, the presidents of Russia and Turkmenistan failed to sign an intergovernmental agreement on building an East-West pipeline across Turkmenistan, to link the huge Iolotan deposit in northeast Turkmenistan to the Caspian Sea.
In April, as demand dropped in Europe, Gazprom drastically scaled down imports from Turkmenistan through the Central Asia-Center-4 pipeline, which led to strain on the Turkmen section of the pipeline and eventually an explosion on April 9. Gazprom in fact constricted Turkmenistan's key gas export route by cutting purchases.
One of the key problems hampering the Transcaspian project is unregulated status of the Caspian offshore areas, which gives Russia a chance to block the pipeline's construction along the seabed. In case it does, the declaration includes a revived idea of building a liquefaction plant in Turkmenistan and shipping LNG by tankers to Azerbaijan and on to Europe.
However, analysts do not believe this project is economically viable and has a purely political purpose. "It is absolutely unprofitable to carry gas a mere 350 km by tankers. It is simply a threat issued to pressure Russia," said Mikhail Krutikhin, a partner in Moscow's RusEnergy Consulting. "Capital costs of shipping 1 billion cubic meters of gas well-to-consumer to Europe from Qatar add up to $600 million," he added. This is ten times more expensive than using existing pipelines across Russia.
Vedomosti
Transdnestr wants to legalize Russian ruble on its territory
A draft law on the introduction of the Russian ruble to free circulation has been introduced to the Supreme Council of the unrecognized Transdnestr Moldovan Republic, a representative from the group that developed the law told Vedomosti.
In practice the Russian ruble has long been the republic's main currency (the Transdnestr ruble is not a convertable currency and has no international currency code). According to Andrei Grozin from the CIS Institute, about 80% of payments are made in Russian rubles or in foreign currency, with some companies paying their salaries in Russian rubles.
One of the deputies in the Supreme Council, Andrei Sipchenko, said: "A partnership with Russia, having a stable currency and the possibility of economic growth, could be a stabilizing influence on the Transdnestr economy, and could facilitate the increase in exports from Transdnestr".
An official in the republic's Ministry of Economics thinks that the introduction of the ruble will help local exporters minimize their exchange losses, and will make the republic more of an attractive place to invest, primarily for Russian investors. According to his figures, trade with Russia provides about 40% of the republic's export and more than 32% of its import. One of the republic's main exporters is the Moldovan Metallurgical Factory which is managed by Metalloinvest.
Representatives of the Bank of the Transdnestr Republic, the Bank of Russia and the Russian Finance Ministry refused to comment.
Grozin mentions that Russia has officially approved the extension of the use of the ruble to Belarus alone. But the first deputy head of the Central Bank, Alexander Khandruyev, points out that no agreement from the Bank of Russia is needed. Regarding the creation of a classic currency board, when Transdnestr's local currency becomes tied to the ruble that could act as an anchor, he says.
In September 2006, 97% of the population of Transdnestr were in favor of independence and a subsequent union with Russia.
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