January 2, 2015:
The Islamic State is gaining ground in Russia. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reports that, over the past month-and-a-half, no fewer than six different rebel commanders in the North Caucasus have switched affiliations, abandoning their loyalty to the al-Qaeda-linked Caucasus Emirate and aligning themselves with the Islamic State terrorist group. The defectors include Dagestan warlords Sultan Zaynalabidov, Rustam Aselderov and Abu-Mukhammad Agachaulsky, as well as Chechen separatist leader Makhran Saidov. The news, RFE/RL notes, marks a significant development in the Islamist insurgency in the North Caucasus, and calls into question the continued viability of the Emirate, once Russia's most formidable - and consolidated - jihadist group.
In an effort to mitigate the effects of Western sanctions, the Russian government has committed to providing the country's banks with extra financial capital. In the past week alone, the Russian government invested 100 billion rubles ($1.7 billion) in Russian bank VTB and nearly 40 billion rubles ($680 million) in Gazprombank,CNN reports. Although the interbank lending rate has surged in Russia, financial institutions are growing wary of lending to one another, resulting in an intensified reliance on government assistance. 2014 proved to be a rough year for Russia's Central Bank, as it burned through more than $120 billion in foreign currency supplies while struggling to stabilize the ruble and keep the country's economic crisis under control.
January 4:
The Russian government is waging what amounts to unprecedented "information war" against the West in its efforts to shape international opinion over the Ukraine conflict specifically, and its place in the world more generally. Writing in Politico, Russian media expert Peter Pomerantsev outlines a hybrid structure of multiple, overlapping channels, of content that fuses "western style entertainment plus authoritarianism," and which plays on the ideological, political and economic fears of ordinary Russians to strengthen the Kremlin's hold on power.
The scope of the challenge, Pomerantsev makes clear, is daunting - and a clear grasp of it is still far from common in the West. The U.S. and Europe "have little understanding of the Kremlin's 'weaponization of information,'" he writes. "Kremlin news channels are not simply brattish versions of the BBC or CNN, they are also military and intelligence tools, particularly potent in regions with large Russian speaking populations, or those such as Latin America or the Middle East where anti-Americanism is already strong and where the Kremlin is extending its broadcasting reach."
January 5:
Is Paris going wobbly on Russian sanctions? The BBC reports that, after meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, French President Francois Hollande has floated the possibility of ending sanctions against Russia if progress is made in talks with Moscow over a stable resolution to the Ukrainian crisis. Hollande's call was apparently made on the basis of Putin's assurances that he "doesn't want to annex eastern Ukraine," in Hollande's words. But France is hardly the only country calling for an easing of sanctions against Moscow. A number of other European nations, including Italy, Hungary and Slovakia, have done so as well, suggesting a fracturing of the fragile European consensus in favor of maintaining pressure on Moscow.
January 6:
NATO's primary focus in the coming year will be countering Russia, the Associated Press reports. According to the news agency, the Atlantic Alliance has made it a key priority to create a new rapid reaction force - one capable of deploying on short notice in response to Russian aggression on the European continent. The force, now in formation, is part of what NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg has called "the biggest reinforcement of our collective defense since the end of the Cold War."
Want these sent to your inbox?
Subscribe