Russia Reform Monitor: No. 1815

January 12:

Thousands of Russians took to the streets to protest the recent ban on U.S. adoptions of Russian children. Police estimated attendance at 9,500 people, Reuters reports, but witnesses insist that at least 40,000 people joined the march through central Moscow, carrying signs and shouting popular opposition slogans such as “Russia without Putin.” “I realize it’s pointless and that they won’t reverse the law,” noted one protestor, “but I had to be here . . . For the Americans it’s not such a big deal; they can go on adopting other children around the world. But for our children there is no hope. Our country always takes revenge against the weakest ones, makes their lives even more miserable.”

January 14:

The Kremlin offered a rare public response following the protest, with officials insisting that the ban was a necessary measure to create a “Russia without orphans.” According to the Christian Science Monitor, officials maintain that the law was passed as part of a larger effort to promote domestic adoptions. A plan currently under consideration, written by Kremlin human rights commissioner Pavel Astakov, argues that all 120,000 children currently living in Russian state orphanages could be placed into foster homes or permanent families if adoption regulations were eased. Critics remain skeptical of the new program, as one activist noted that “it’s certainly worthwhile to ask why . . . in Russia we have a stable orphan population of 2.6 percent . . . but the main thrust of what they are proposing is that families who agree to adopt a child should be materially rewarded. This is not right; adoption should not be based on material factors.”

January 15:

Another shooting in Dagestan led to the death of a senior judge in the region’s capitol. Reuters reports that a gunman opened fire on the judge from close range before fleeing the scene. Magomed Magomedov, a member of Dagestan’s Supreme Court, was the latest victim in a series of shootings and bomb attacks targeting the region’s officials. Authorities blame militant groups who say they are fighting to establish an Islamic state in the region.

Russia’s Cold War-era spy tactics continue to produce embarrassing international incidents. In a case that resembles the discovery of a spy ring in the United States in 2010, German authorities are currently pursuing espionage charges against a couple believed to have been spying for Russia, and the Soviet Union before it, since the late 1980s. German authorities report that when the couple was arrested in late 2011, they discovered the woman sitting in front of a wireless transmitter, receiving encoded messages on a shortwave frequency hooked up by cable to a computer. The couple stands accused of passing confidential documents regarding NATO operations to Russian intelligence services. Both deny the charges, reports the BBC, but a trial and conviction could damage relations between Berlin and Moscow.

January 17:

Russo-American relations, which have been tense since the Kremlin's institution of a controversial adoption ban, took another hit. A decade-old squabble over a collection of Jewish books and documents led to an exchange of threats after a U.S. District Court judge imposed a fine of $50,000 a day for failing to return the collection of over 12,000 books and 50,000 religious papers. Russian officials immediately warned that such a fine would draw retaliation, reports the New York Times, adding that “the Russian Foreign Ministry regards as absolutely unlawful and provocative the decision of the federal court in Washington,” and calling the fine “legally void.” A Moscow court ordered the return of the collection in 1991, but the Soviet Union collapsed soon after, and the judgment was dismissed by Russian officials.

January 18:

The Kremlin has released the “Guantanamo list,” the long-promised retaliatory blacklist of American nationals barred from entering Russia. The list was expected to include eleven names, Bloomberg reports, but identified seventy-one U.S. nationals when released, including managers of the Guantanamo Bay military detention center and a U.S. citizen accused of kidnapping Russian nationals. The list was designed as a reprisal against the United States following last year’s Magnitsky Act, which levied a visa ban and asset freeze on Russian officials connected with the death of Sergei Magnitsky as well as others guilty of human rights abuses.