Posts Tagged ‘conservative friends of russia’

12
March 2013

In Plain Sight: The Kremlin’s London Lobby

World Affairs

Although the US-Russian relationship continues to deteriorate in the face of a vengeful Kremlin ban on American adoptions of Russian orphans, Vladimir Putin is still pursuing a strategy of influencing—and infiltrating—European political establishments. Given the amount of capital that Russia and her billionaire oligarchs have invested in the continent, this policy is as much defensive as it is self-interested. The European Commission’s deadly-serious investigation into Gazprom’s monopolistic practices, the beginning of the end of German Ostpolitik, and the ongoing dispute with Russia over the Syria crisis hint at an imminent confrontation between Moscow and EU countries. And while state-owned media outlets turn out anti-American propaganda to match equivalent policy measures, for the time being, Russia is still very much committed to swaying European opinion by using both transparent economic appeals (especially in the energy sector, the Gazprom case notwithstanding) and also the kind of Le Carré–esque skulduggery that was supposed to have vanished with the Cold War.

One recent episode of Moscow’s see-through machinations involved a London-based lobby group Conservative Friends of Russia (CFoR). Launched in August 2012—in the garden of the Russian ambassador to Britain, no less—and shut down in December, CFoR’s brief existence might have gone unnoticed but for two developments. The first was the number of Tory parliamentarians who joined its governance, including Sir Malcolm Rifkind, Margaret Thatcher’s former foreign minister and the current chairman of the Intelligence and Security Committee in the House of Commons. The second was the way CFoR, which presented itself as a “neutral” talk-shop about British-Russian relations, followed slavishly the talking points of the Russian Foreign Ministry. The chairman of CFoR, Richard Royal—a communications specialist at Ladbrokes, the world’s largest retail bookmaker, and a former aide to Tory MPs—even gave an interview to the founder of a notorious neo-Nazi group in Russia in which he spoke about the Caucasus, Russia’s counterterrorism policies, and other matters high on the agenda of any chauvinistic ultranationalist.

Several Tories I spoke to, including one of the MPs formerly attached to the organization, told me they had felt all along that CFoR was little more than a serially embarrassed front for “useful idiots” (his words). Sure enough, the final act of public relations seppuku came on November 23rd when CFoR sent out a press release clumsily attacking Labor MP Chris Bryant, who heads the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Russia in the House of Commons and who’s known for his tough line against the Kremlin. A photo Bryant posted on an online dating site ten years ago showing him in his underpants was leaked to the tabloid press. Without mentioning his hardheadedness on Russia’s lurch toward totalitarianism, CFoR deployed that image in a press release attacking Bryant’s stewardship of the APPG, which was up for renewal the following week. (He handily won reelection.)

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02
December 2012

Tory blushes deepen over activities of Conservative Friends of Russia

The Guardian

It seemed like the perfect fact-finding mission. Ten days in Moscow and St Petersburg, trips to the state ballet (Figaro and Don Quixote), and meetings with top Russian politicians. There was a visit to the world-famous Hermitage Museum. Not to mention gala dinners and an afternoon sightseeing at the Kremlin.

At least four activists from the Conservative Friends of Russia group took part in the trip in September. A photo shows the Tories posing on a red carpet inside the Duma, Russia’s state parliament. The official itinerary describes them, flatteringly, as “young political leaders from Great Britain”. Best of all, a Russian federal cultural agency, Rossotrudnichestvo, picked up the bill for travel, hotel and tickets.

Three months later, the group is in disarray, amid questions about its behind-the-scenes links to the Russian embassy in London and its alleged uncritical cheerleading for Vladimir Putin. Last week, its honorary president, Sir Malcolm Rifkind, resigned. Rifkind said he had been unhappy for some time about the group’s behaviour and “political direction”.

The “final straw” came when Conservative Friends of Russia launched a scurrilous attack on the Labour MP Chris Bryant, and posted a photo of Bryant in his Y-fronts, Rifkind said. More resignations followed. Since the weekend, two more Tory MPs have quit, Robert Buckland and deputy speaker Nigel Evans.

Most humiliating of all, Prince Michael of Kent – a Russian-speaker who looks uncannily like Russia’s last tsar – pulled out of the group’s “old” new year dinner at the SamarQuand restaurant.

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26
November 2012

Friends of Russia or Friends of Putin?

Standpoint

The recently-established lobby group Conservative Friends of Russia (CFOR) is doing little to dispel suspicions that its sympathies lie with the Russian government.

Last week it published an article on its website accusing the Chairman of the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Russia, Chris Bryant, of “incompetence” over his failure to hold an annual general meeting at the required time. To accompany the piece, which has now been taken off their site, CFOR selected the snapshot of Mr Bryant in his underwear, originally posted on a gay dating site, which circulated in the tabloids years ago. The relevance of that particular photo to his stewardship of the APPG was not explained.

This most recent episode of sophomoric hackery has induced Honorary Chairman Sir Malcolm Rifkind to resign his post, and Robert Buckland to step down as Honorary Vice President. According to the Telegraph, “A spokesman for Sir Malcolm said he was ‘very unhappy’ about the article and it was the ‘final straw’, adding to long-held concerns about the way the group was being run.”

Bryant has responded by accusing CFOR of engaging in crude, Kremlin-esque tactics to discredit him and force his resignation as the Chairman of the Russia APPG, and suggested that the group is acting at the behest of the Russian embassy: “I gather the Conservative Friends of Russia have covered themselves in homophobic glory,” and “clearly [they] would prefer a Putin patsy to run the all-party group on Russia. Did the Embassy pay for them?” CFOR chairman Richard Royal responded by accusing Bryant of using alleged homophobia as a “smokescreen [to] divert attention from the real issue”.

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23
November 2012

Moscow-on-Thames

Foreign Policy

When most people think of British-Russian relations, they imagine Bond films, iron curtains, Cambridge double agents, irradiated dissidents, and billionaire oligarchs who dress like Evelyn Waugh but behave like Tony Soprano and then sue each other in London courts. But there’s another element underwriting this not-so-special relationship.

British elites, elected or otherwise, have grown highly susceptible to the unscrutinized rubles that continue to pour into the boom-or-boom London real estate market and a luxury-service industry catering to wealthy Russians who are as bodyguarded as they are jet-set. This phenomenon has not only imported some of the worst practices of a mafia state across the English Channel, but it has had a deleterious impact on Britain’s domestic politics. And some of the most powerful and well-connected figures of British public life, from the Rothschilds to former prime ministers, have been taken in by it. Most surprising, though, is how the heirs to Margaret Thatcher’s fierce opposition to the Soviets have often been the ones most easily seduced by the Kremlin’s entreaties.

On Aug. 21, a new lobby group called Conservative Friends of Russia (CFoR) was launched at the London home of Alexander Yakovenko, the Russian ambassador to Britain. The launch was attended by some 250 guests, including parliamentarians, Conservative Party members, businessmen, lobbyists, NGO representatives, and even princes. Yakovenko and Member of Parliament John Whittingdale, who chairs the Culture Select Committee in Parliament and is an “honorary vice president” of CFoR, both delivered keynote addresses. The lavish do in the backyard of the Kremlin envoy featured, as the Guardian reported, a “barbecue, drinks and a raffle, with prizes of vodka, champagne and a biography of Vladimir Putin,” and it came just days after the Pussy Riot verdict. It was an open invitation to controversy. If CFoR wanted to portray itself as merely a promoter of “dialogue” between Britain and Russia, it was an odd beginning for a group born looking and sounding a lot like “Tories for Putin.”

CFoR was founded by Richard Royal, a public affairs manager at Ladbrokes, a popular chain of betting parlors in Britain. He also owns his own company, Lionheart Public Affairs, which has no website but shares a registered address with the new pro-Russia lobby group. Responding to the storm of criticism his new project has provoked, Royal took to the Guardian’s website to defend the initiative against what he called “armchair critics on Twitter,” in language you’d expect from a PR professional. “Whether we like it or not,” Royal wrote, “Russia is an influential and essential part of the international community and its importance will only grow over time. We need to stop making decisions based on misconceptions that are decades old, and deal with reality.”

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