Posts Tagged ‘reset’
Freedom House Questions for Republican Presidential Candidates
It is a core belief of Freedom House that American foreign policy should be grounded on support for democratic values and the global expansion of freedom. Practically every aspirant to the American presidency would agree that the United States should remain the world’s beacon of democracy. But especially in an era of rival claims for global leadership and calls for fiscal austerity, the development of a U.S. strategy to propel freedom forward poses a serious challenge. Thus far, the presidential candidates have failed to grapple with the complexities of this challenge, and the discussion has been far from illuminating, to put it mildly.
The questions below, drawn up by Freedom House staff, have been submitted to the sponsors of the debate on foreign policy scheduled for Tuesday night. We offer them in the hope that they will focus the minds of leading politicians, both within and beyond the Republican Party, on the critical issue of U.S. support for democratic institutions and values at a time when the adversaries of freedom are emboldened and the newest aspiring democracies are particularly vulnerable.
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The Value of Values: Soft Power Under Obama
One irony of the Obama presidency is how much it relies on hard power. The president came into office proposing a dramatic shift from George W. Bush’s perceived unilateralism, and most of his predecessor’s hard-edged counterterrorism tactics and massive deployments in wars abroad. Yet after three years, Obama has escalated forces in Afghanistan, embraced the widespread use of unmanned drones to kill terrorists at the risk of civilian casualties, kept Guantánamo open, and killed Osama bin Laden in Pakistan in a thoroughly unilateral fashion.
What he hasn’t accomplished to any great degree is what most observers assumed would be the hallmark of his approach to foreign affairs—a full assertion of the soft power that makes hard power more effective. His 2008 campaign centered on a critique of President Bush’s overreliance on hard power. Obama suggested he would rehabilitate the damaged image of America created by these excesses and show that the United States was not a cowboy nation. Upon taking office, he made fresh-start statements, such as his June 2009 remarks in Cairo, and embraced political means like dialogue, respectful multilateralism, and the use of new media, suggesting that he felt the soft power to change minds, build legitimacy, and advance interests was the key element missing from the recent US approach to the world—and that he would quickly remedy that defect.
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Conservatives rally to McFaul’s defens
Senate Foreign Relations Committee (SFRC) approval of Mike McFaul’s nomination to become U.S. ambassador to Russia was delayed on Tuesday by GOP senators, but today several Republicans are coming to McFaul’s aid.
A group of former GOP national security officials wrote to SFRC leaders John Kerry (D-MA) and Richard Lugar (R-IN) today to express their support for the McFaul nomination, which is now facing objections from one SFRC member now and with multiple other GOP senators ready to follow suit, who will make their concerns known if and when McFaul is voted out of committee. In fact, the entire SFRC business meeting was cancelled on Tuesday amid the confusion. It was rescheduled for Nov. 29, when McFaul’s nomination will finally be put before the panel.
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Senators Push to Keep 2 Russian Generals Out of U.S.
U.S. lawmakers are moving to block the planned visit to the U.S. of two Russian generals who they say helped cover up the murder of a Russian whistleblower in prison three years ago.
Their appeal in a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton ratchets up pressure on the Obama administration, which is defending a “reset” in relations with Moscow as a major foreign-policy accomplishment. Some in Congress have been calling for a tougher line toward Moscow.
The case of the dead whistleblower, Sergei Magnitsky, has been a source of friction in Russia-U.S. relations, and the Kremlin has bristled at a visa ban that the U.S. implemented on Russian officials linked to Mr. Magnitsky’s imprisonment and death.
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Taking on Russia: A global financier fights back after a lawyer’s suspicious death in prison
IF YOU think you know what the 1 percent is like, then you haven’t met Bill Browder, the founder of Hermitage Capital Management, a multi-billion dollar investment firm. His personal worth is estimated to be around $100 million. His grandfather was the head of the American Communist party, and when Russian markets opened, Browder seemed to return the favor by exporting capitalism there. Hermitage became the largest investment fund in Russia.
But his career took an unexpected turn. He’s now on a different kind of mission – to pass legislation that would deprive human-rights violators of the things they love: legitimacy, travel, Western goods, and taking their kids to Disneyland. It’s a mission that should please the US government, too.
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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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Russia Claims Longer List Of U.S. Personae Non Gratae
Russia vowed that its tally of undesirable Americans will be longer than the corresponding list of Russians whose travel was restricted by Washington after a investment fund’s lawyer died of untreated illnesses in a Moscow jail.
“Our list will be longer,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told local newswires Tuesday, later admitting that “the names won’t be disclosed.”
Moscow last week confirmed it had put U.S. officials on a visa blacklist, a move that coincided with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s visit to former Soviet republics in central Asia. The U.S. State Department in July had announced its own restrictions, imposed as the Senate was considering not only a travel ban, but also the freezing of U.S. assets linked to 60 officials involved in a case that led to the death of 37-year-old Sergei Magnitsky.
The Russian officials on Senator Benjamin Cardin’s list, which doesn’t necessarily correspond to the State Department’s list, include judges, prosecutors, prison workers and other officials from the Interior Ministry and the Federal Security Service, the successor to the Soviet-era KGB.
For its part, the Russian Foreign Ministry has indicated it may ban travel to Russia for Americans suspected of “wrongful acts against Russian nationals in the U.S.” or linked to what it called the murder of civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan and the detention of prisoners in Guantanamo.
Mr. Magnitsky died in 2009 after testifying in court that senior police officials took documents from an international investment fund, then used them to defraud the Russian government of tens of millions of dollars in tax refunds. Russian investigators said Mr. Magnitsky died of heart disease and hepatitis, and they recently opened probes into a doctor and prison official. Russia’s Foreign Ministry says the U.S. is “well aware of efforts by the Russian authorities to investigate” the lawyer’s death.
Although the Moscow-Washington spat could hurt President Barack Obama’s goal of “resetting” relations with Russia, the reciprocal travel bans, no matter how extensive they turn out to be, are unlikely to dent the tourism industry deeply in the two countries.
The U.S. Department of Commerce expects only 208,000 Russian travelers to visit the U.S. this year, about the same number expected from Ecuador. Meanwhile, Russia reported only 262,000 trips from U.S. citizens last year, about a third as many as from China or Lithuania. займ онлайн займы онлайн на карту срочно female wrestling https://zp-pdl.com/online-payday-loans-in-america.php www.zp-pdl.com займ на карту срочно без отказа
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In Eye for Eye, U.S. Citizens Banned
An unpleasant surprise might await the next White House or Pentagon official who decides to go sightseeing in Moscow or take a dip at Sochi’s beaches: no visa.
The Foreign Ministry announced on Saturday that it has banned entry for unspecified senior U.S. officials, “mirroring” a ban imposed by the U.S. State Department on Russian officials linked to the death of Hermitage Capital lawyer Sergei Magnitsky.
The ministry hinted that the blacklist tit-for-tat could endanger a U.S.-Russian reset in relations. But an independent analyst said Russia’s ban was largely ceremonial because Moscow, if it were serious, would have targeted U.S. businesspeople in Russia.
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‘Magnitsky list’ won’t undermine Russia-US relations, Lavrov says
The so-called Magnitsky list that bars entry to the U.S. for Russian officials allegedly involved in the death of lawyer Sergei Magnitsky, will not undermine relations between the two countries, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Friday.
The relations established by the Obama and Medvedev administrations are strong enough to withstand “various attempts to ruin them,” Lavrov told three Russian radio stations.
“I am sure, that the ‘Magnitsky list’… won’t undermine the foundations of Russia-US relations,” he said.
Magnitsky was arrested and jailed without trial in November 2008, and died in police custody a year later after being denied medical care. The 37-year-old lawyer was working for Hermitage Capital Management, a British-based investment fund, when he accused tax and police officials of carrying out a $230-million tax scam.
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