Posts Tagged ‘kasparov’
An unbeatable insight into the minds that control Russia
Foreigners seeking to explain the paranoia of Kremlin’s elite need only look to the country’s state-sponsored television.
Russia Today, the state-financed television channel for foreigners, is a must-watch. Not because of journalistic excellence: it has glitzy presentation but huge holes in its coverage and bizarre quirks in its editorial outlook. But it does give an unbeatable insight into the minds of the people who run it – and into the regime that sponsors it.
To be fair, I should note that the channel has substantial strengths. It reports thoroughly on official utterances and it covers most of the headline stories in Russia with reasonable professionalism. In that sense it is quite different from the old Soviet media, which simply ignored topics that did not fit the official line. Russia Today has reported, for example, on the grotesque posthumous trial of Sergei Magnitsky, a lawyer who died in prison after exposing a $230 million (€175m) fraud against the Russian taxpayer, perpetrated by officials. It also rarely misses a story about UFOs or life on Venus.
But the hallmark of Russia Today is anti-Westernism. It gleefully highlights weaknesses, anomalies and double standards in countries that like to criticise Russia. The message is blunt: get your own house in order before lecturing others. Human-rights violations, political corruption and economic weaknesses get a particularly enthusiastic outing, even when the factual basis is tenuous or non-existent. One commentator says that the US is fascist. Another report claims that Nazism is on the rise in Germany and the Baltic states.
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The Right Way to Sanction Russia
On Thursday, the U.S. Senate will hold a hearing to discuss the accession of Russia to the World Trade Organization and the repeal of the Jackson-Vanik amendment that impedes American trade relations with Russia. The Obama administration has portrayed it as little more than overdue Cold War housekeeping while touting the imagined economic benefits for American farmers that could result from freer trade with Russia.
But the reality on the ground in today’s authoritarian Russia is far more complex. We support the repeal, both as leaders of the pro-democracy opposition in Russia and as Russian citizens who want our nation to join the modern global economy. It is essential, however, to see the bigger picture of which Jackson-Vanik is a part.
The “election” of Vladimir Putin to the presidency is over, but the fight for democracy in Russia is just beginning. At both major opposition meetings following the fraudulent March 4 election, we publicly resolved that Mr. Putin is not the legitimate leader of Russia. The protests will not cease and we will continue to organize and prepare for a near future without Mr. Putin in the presidency. Getting rid of him and his cronies is a job for Russians, and we do not ask for foreign intervention. We do, however, ask that the U.S. and other leading nations of the Free World cease to provide democratic credentials to Mr. Putin. This is why symbols matter, and why Jackson-Vanik still matters.
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Kasparov: Why Vladimir Putin Is Immune To American Reset
Lecture to Heritage Foundation by Garry Kasparov
Thank you for inviting me to attend this important event here at the Heritage Foundation today. My thanks to Speaker Boehner[1] and all the other participants for their interest and their comments.
For a little introduction of myself, there’s one fact from my biography that is always omitted. Many here might not be aware that I myself am from the Deep South, right next to Georgia. I’m referring to the Deep South of the Soviet Union. That’s my hometown of Baku, Azerbaijan, where I was born in 1963, next to what is now the Republic of Georgia.
Of course, much has changed since then. There are no more Communists in the Republic of Georgia—much as there are no more Democrats in the state of Georgia—and Georgia is as good a place as any to begin my talk on the Putin regime’s immunity to America’s attempts at a “reset.” Georgia is currently under great pressure from the U.S. and others to allow Russia to join the World Trade Organization, despite two large pieces of Georgian sovereign territory being occupied by Russian forces.
Many in the media and even some governments refer to Abkhazia and South Ossetia as “disputed territories,” not occupied, ignoring the fact they were taken by military force. Often, this is the same media that refers to parts of Palestine as “occupied” by Israel. Despite heavy pressure from Vladimir Putin’s Russia, Georgia has remained staunchly pro-democratic and pro-Western, and yet it appears that getting Russia into the WTO is of greater importance to this U.S. Administration than protecting the rights and territory of an ally.
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Who’s king of the castle?
At first, playing chess against Garry Kasparov is much like playing chess against anyone else. Take the pieces. They look the same as when you are playing against other people. They move the same way. For some reason this is surprising to me, and so is the fact that we are five moves in and he has not checkmated me yet. He must be off his game, or, just maybe, dare I hope, I am a lot smarter than I thought I was?
But there he is, across the table, actually thinking about his next move. I have a rush of satisfaction. Brain the size of a planet, the greatest chess player who ever lived, and I have made him think.
This moment has been a long time coming. When I had originally explained to Kasparov’s assistant that I wanted to play chess against the great man himself, she had made it clear that this was asking quite a lot, but she would see what she could do.
Then, when I arrive at his flat, I have to re-explain my errand to his mother, who seems to run the PR show for Garry Kasparov Inc. “What rank are you?” she finally asks.
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Statement by United Civil Front Chairman Garry Kasparov
Statement by United Civil Front Chairman Garry Kasparov
Prepared on December 12, 2011
Just two days ago, my country of Russia saw the largest public protests since the fall of the Soviet Union twenty years ago. Well over a hundred thousand Russians took to the streets, over 40,000 in Moscow alone. The fraudulent parliamentary elections of the previous week were the spark for the protesters’ outrage, but the fuel of the fire is the increasingly dictatorial regime of Vladimir Putin and his puppet, Dmitri Medvedev. So far, their regime’s response to the overwhelming rejection of their corruption and oppression has been to ignore it. Putin plans to return as president in March, 2012, in what will surely be another fraudulent election, with the term of office now having been extended to six years.
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Russians Need To Respect Themselves
Teemu Matinpuro, executive director of the Finnish Peace Committee, and Kerkko Paananen, information secretary of the Finnish-Russian Civic Forum (FINROSFORUM), gave an interview to Lyudmila Mamina, editor-in-chief of Kasparov.Ru, about the Finnish edition of Novaya Gazeta, the attitude of Finnish society to Anna Politkovskaya, the war in Chechnya, and the current political situation in Russia. Below, an edited translation of the interview.
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Kasparov: “How I ‘Called’ for War on Russia”
Several days ago I spoke at a conference in Washington on the subject of the reset in relations between Russia and the US organized by the conservative Heritage Foundation, which traditionally represents the interests of the Republican Party. The fact that the main presenter was Speaker of the House of Representatives and Republican John Boehner shows how seriously the Republican Party is going to look at this issue during the upcoming electoral cycle. And there is nothing shocking about this. Every other foreign policy issue, whether it’s Afghanistan, Iran, or Iraq, is linked in one way or another with the actions of the Bush administration, while the idea for the reset in relations with Russia and the bets that were hedged on Medvedev – or, more specifically, on a split within the tandem – was thought up and materialized by the Obama administration. Putin’s imminent return to the post of president makes obvious the failure of Obama’s attempt to support “liberal modernizers” in the Kremlin, which the Republicans will undoubtedly remind him of before the next election.
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Obama’s Russia Reset a ‘Disaster’
Chess champ-turned-opposition leader Garry Kasparov tells Eli Lake the upcoming Russian elections will be a “charade” and Obama’s Russia policy is a “disaster.” And he spares no word for George W. Bush or Condi Rice, either.
Many democratic opposition figures in countries sliding toward authoritarianism see Western election monitors as a lifeline, a chance for a fair election that might be fixed if not for the watchful eye of outside observers. That’s not the case for Garry Kasparov, the iconic chess champion who has emerged as a public face of Russian opposition to Vladimir Putin’s grip on power.
“We are asking Americans and Europeans not to send observers,” Kasparov said in an exclusive interview. “You understand Putin will get whatever he wants. What is the point of pretending this is an election? It’s a charade. Don’t interfere with it, just don’t pay respect to the charade.”
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Turning the Chessboard
After the public humiliation of Medvedev on September 24, one would think that even his most devout followers, the ones who tried in vain to find the reform-minded characteristics of a “liberating tsar” in the pale image of Putin’s shadow, had ought to have turned their backs on him. The first one to emerge from their stupor was Sergei Aleksashenko (naturally, the people with the most direct connections to money will react to the operative changes of a situation quicker than others), who decided to refute our image of Medvedev as a weak leader without any willpower. After that, Igor Jurgens told us unabashedly that, regardless of the apocalyptic predictions that he and Yevgeny Gontmakher have been eagerly feeding the Russian press over the course of the past year, life is not going to end after Putin’s return to the Kremlin. “We will continue modernization, because there’s no other option,” – with this phrase, one of the main ideologues of systemic Russian liberalism has once again confirmed that the members of the Institute of Contemporary Development saw the campaign in support of Medvedev as a purely tactical measure related to additional opportunities to influence the situation in the country. Whereas it is impossible for liberals of the court to have strategic differences with the Putin regime.
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