February 8:
The Wall Street Journal reports that Russian election officials stand to gain if Dmitry Medvedev wins the March 2nd presidential election outright and can use money that would otherwise have to be spent on a second round of voting on staff bonuses. About one billion rubles, or about $40.6 million, has been earmarked for a possible second round. According to the newspaper, when asked whether the Central Election Commission’s decision to give officials a financial incentive to conduct a single-round vote might be unethical, officials balked. “You can fantasize [about the reasoning behind the bonus program] as much as you want,” said Stanislav Bisin, a senior election official in the Nizhny Novgorod region, confirming his intention to pay his own staff bonuses.
Andreas Gross, head of the election observation team from the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, which is the only Western group planning to monitor Russia’s presidential vote, has said that the campaign has been unfair and slanted in favor of Dmitry Medvedev. “While in principle the coverage is equal, one of the candidates - the very important one - enjoys the benefits of his office so in reality it is not equal,” Reuters quotes Gross as telling reporters. “An election where there is not a level playing field for all contestants can hardly be considered as fair. We are afraid that the election will not be fair enough and not free enough but the game is not over yet... because it can still be improved and we will come and see what happens from now to then."
President Vladimir Putin has addressed a meeting of the State Council, a Kremlin advisory body, on the theme of Russia’s development through to 2020. Putin defended his record over eight years, saying he took a country with a “large part of the economy... in the hands of oligarchs or openly criminal organizations” and a “large-scale civil war” emanating from the North Caucasus and achieved “stability.” Calling the fact that half of Russian men die before the age of 60 a “disgrace,” Putin said Russia should raise the average life expectancy to 75 over the next twelve years. He also called for measures to ensure that 60-70 percent of Russia’s population is in the middle class by 2020.
In an oblique reference to opposition groups, Putin said: “Irresponsible demagogy and attempts to divide society and use foreign help or intervention in domestic political struggles are not only immoral but are illegal. They belittle our people’s dignity and undermine our democratic state.”
February 11:
Anatoly Chubais, the architect of Russia’s controversial 1990s privatization program who now heads United Energy Systems, Russia’s electricity monopoly, has warned that Russia could soon face a financial crisis that could grow into a political one. In an interview with The New Times, Chubais said Russia could lose its trade surplus in two or three years because of global financial problems and thereby lose its “motor of growth.” Russia, he told the weekly magazine, will then face the choice of blaming the problems on the West, closing off the country and protecting domestic commodity producers – a choice which, according to Chubais, would be “catastrophic” – or returning to “liberal” economic policies.
Russia has agreed to write off $12 billion of Iraqi debt in return for Russian companies getting access to invest up to $4 billion in Iraq, the BBC reports. The deal was signed by Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin and Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari, who is visiting Moscow. Russia’s Lukoil is expected to develop oilfields in Iraq including West Qurna, one of the country’s largest.