Толстый и тонкий

[Prospero]

February 1, 2016 6:40 pm

 

Putin lines up state sell-offs to plug budget hole

Kathrin Hille in Moscow

 

Moscow has continuously sold small state company stakes over the years, but progress has slowed since Vladimir Putin’s return to the presidency in 2012. Memories of the privatisation wave with which Russia’s liberal economic policymakers tried to force a transition from the Soviet economy in the 1990s remain traumatic as it vastly enriched a small number of people, creating the country’s oligarch class.

The heads of Alrosa, Rosneft and fellow oil company Bashneft, Russian Railways, state bank VTB, Aeroflot and Russia’s largest shipbuilding company Sovcomflot were summoned on Monday to a meeting where Mr Putin discussed privatisation plans for this year with his economic team.

“Previously, privatisation was mainly driven by the intention to adjust the structure of the economy and make it more efficient,” said Oleg Kouzmin, Russia economist at Renaissance Capital.

“Now, the issue of raising cash as we see a big drop in oil prices has become one of the reasons that privatisation is back on the agenda,”

Brent Crude fell 4 per cent on Monday to US$34.50. The cabinet under prime minister Dmitry Medvedev is scrambling to amend its 2016 budget. It was planned on the assumption of a 3 per cent deficit based on crude prices averaging US$50 per barrel, the level of early November.

For Russia, which relied on oil and gas revenues for more than half of its budget until 2014, the slide is deeply painful. Last year, lower oil prices drove the share of oil and gas down to 43 per cent of budget revenues. It is expected to slide to below 35 per cent if crude averages at US$30 per barrel, according to Sberbank CIB, the investment banking arm of Russia’s largest lender by assets.

 

Moscow has already agreed a 10 per cent expenditure cut and planned for sequestration, two steps that are expected to save close to Rbs1tn ($13bn). “But if oil averages at US$30, they will need another Rbs500-1,000bn to meet their 3 per cent deficit target,” said Mr Kouzmin.

The single largest potential source of funds is privatisation. So far, investors are deeply sceptical about Moscow’s ability to follow through as the corruption-tainted sales of state assets in the 1990s have tainted the concept of privatisation for many Russians.

“Any sale at too-low prices will expose us to suspicions that we’re doing something like in the 1990s again,” said one government official.

In 2010, when Mr Putin swapped his presidential post with Mr Medvedev, the government pledged to privatise stakes in a smattering of state firms. But most large planned deals have been delayed until now. Many of the companies targeted then are among those the Kremlin is looking at now.

One person familiar with the thinking at Rosneft said chief executive Igor Sechin had dismissed talk of privatising the oil firm and insisted no decision had been made.

“Looking at this long list, Sovcomflot is the only case in which I see a realistic chance,” said the head of a European bank in Russia.

Mr Putin on Monday damped hopes of too ambitious an agenda. The state must not lose control of strategic companies, and state enterprise stakes must only sold to buyers registered in Russia, he said at the meeting of executives. The president also warned: “There shall be no sale of shares for a pittance or at knockdown prices.”

 

[Eraserhead]

Chechnya's Kadyrov puts Putin critic Kasyanov in gunsights

 

'

 

Chechnya's leader Ramzan Kadyrov has posted an Instagram video showing Russian opposition politician Mikhail Kasyanov in a sniper's crosshairs.

[Lord Protector]

 

 

Putin meets ‘old friend’ Kissinger visiting Russia

3 Feb, 2016 

 

Former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. © kremlin.ru

 

Russian President Vladimir Putin has met former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger in his residence outside Moscow. The Kremlin said that the two have “long-standing, friendly relations” and that they have used the “opportunity to talk.”

The meeting is a continuation of a “friendly dialogue between President Putin and Henry Kissinger, who are bound by a longstanding relationship,” said Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov.

“They communicate all the time, use the opportunity to talk,” he added. Putin “values” this opportunity to discuss pressing international issues as well as exchange opinions on global perspectives, Peskov said.

 

The President has received Henry Kissinger, former US Secretary of State, at Novo-Ogaryovo https://t.co/rS8Xe0RaHBpic.twitter.com/bMUzBpZ297

— President of Russia (@KremlinRussia_E) February 3, 2016

Putin and Kissenger have had over 10 tete-a-tete meetings so far, according to media reports. When Kissinger visited Russia in 2013 Putin said that Moscow always pays attention to his opinion and called the former secretary of state "a world class politician."

Kissinger, a former US national security adviser and foreign policy head, pioneered the detente policy in 1969 steering the US-Soviet relations to a general ease. For his part in negotiating a ceasefire in Vietnam in an unsuccessful effort to put an end to the Vietnam war (1955-1975) he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1973.

In a December interview with German newspaper Handelsblatt, Kissinger said that he believes the West should understand there could be no resolution to the Syrian crisis and unity without Russia’s participation. He also said that one cannot defeat Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISISL) militants in the Middle East using diplomatic means.

 

''keep your friends close but your enemies closer''. Matori lisac je došao u Moskvu da izvidi situaciju na licu mesta iako je bolestan.

Edited February 3, 2016 by slow

[namenski]

Nisko ti Slowe pala Rusija: glej mrcinu jebote 

[Lord Protector]

Ne treba potcenjivati starog consiglierea ni kada poklone donosi

 

 

[Ryan Franco]

očekivao sam da se komentariše novi singl pusi rajot kad ono ništa

[namenski]

Za darove ne znam, nasla rupa zakrpu, ovaj tvoj konsiljere je danas otprilike u rangu Segala: na svecanoj veceri, ako je bude, Putin ili Medvedev ce morati da ga hrane na kasikicu, sumnjam da razlikuje usta od usiju... 

[namenski]

Pitanje: zna li se, propaganda na stranu, sta od stranih jezika govori Putin?

[Lord Protector]

nemački, i to prilično dobro po rečima Nemaca

Edited February 3, 2016 by slow

[Takeshi]

kad ce sa bzezinskim da se sastane? 

[bigvlada]

Kada budu snimali RED 3. 

[levi]

Kad će da se sretne sa Nemcovim? 

[Prospero]

 

Putin meets ‘old friend’ Kissinger visiting Russia

3 Feb, 2016 

 

 

...

''keep your friends close but your enemies closer''. Matori lisac je došao u Moskvu da izvidi situaciju na licu mesta iako je bolestan.

 

Henri™ dobio viziju nakon susreta:

 

Kissinger’s Vision for U.S.-Russia Relations

 

 

 

 

Russia should be perceived as an essential element of any new global equilibrium.

 

Henry A. Kissinger

 February 4, 2016

 

 

From 2007 into 2009, Evgeny Primakov and I chaired a group composed of retired senior ministers, high officials and military leaders from Russia and the United States, including some of you present here today. Its purpose was to ease the adversarial aspects of the U.S.-Russian relationship and to consider opportunities for cooperative approaches. In America, it was described as a Track II group, which meant it was bipartisan and encouraged by the White House to explore but not negotiate on its behalf. We alternated meetings in each other’s country. President Putin received the group in Moscow in 2007, and President Medvedev in 2009. In 2008, President George W. Bush assembled most of his National Security team in the Cabinet Room for a dialogue with our guests.

 

All the participants had held responsible positions during the Cold War. During periods of tension, they had asserted the national interest of their country as they understood it. But they had also learned through experience the perils of a technology threatening civilized life and evolving in a direction which, in crisis, might disrupt any organized human activity. Upheavals were looming around the globe, magnified in part by different cultural identities and clashing ideologies. The goal of the Track II effort was to overcome crises and explore common principles of world order.

 

Evgeny Primakov was an indispensable partner in this effort. His sharp analytical mind combined with a wide grasp of global trends acquired in years close to and ultimately at the center of power, and his great devotion to his country refined our thinking and helped in the quest for a common vision. We did not always agree, but we always respected each other. He is missed by all of us and by me personally as a colleague and a friend.

 

I do not need to tell you that our relations today are much worse than they were a decade ago. Indeed, they are probably the worst they have been since before the end of the Cold War. Mutual trust has been dissipated on both sides. Confrontation has replaced cooperation. I know that in his last months, Evgeny Primakov looked for ways to overcome this disturbing state of affairs. We would honor his memory by making that effort our own.

 

At the end of the Cold War, both Russians and Americans had a vision of strategic partnership shaped by their recent experiences. Americans were expecting that a period of reduced tensions would lead to productive cooperation on global issues. Russian pride in their role in modernizing their society was tempered by discomfort at the transformation of their borders and recognition of the monumental tasks ahead in reconstruction and redefinition. Many on both sides understood that the fates of Russia and the United States remained tightly intertwined. Maintaining strategic stability and preventing the spread of weapons of mass destruction became a growing necessity, as did the building of a security system for Eurasia, especially along Russia’s long periphery. New vistas opened up in trade and investment; cooperation in the field of energy topped the list.

 

Regrettably, the momentum of global upheaval has outstripped the capacities of statesmanship. Evgeny Primakov’s decision as prime minister, on a flight over the Atlantic to Washington, to order his plane to turn around and return to Moscow to protest the start of NATO military operations in Yugoslavia was symbolic. The initial hopes that the close cooperation in the early phases of the campaign against Al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan might lead to partnership on a broader range of issues weakened in the vortex of disputes over Middle East policy, and then collapsed with the Russian military moves in the Caucasus in 2008 and Ukraine in 2014. The more recent efforts to find common ground in the Syria conflict and to defuse the tension over Ukraine have done little to change the mounting sense of estrangement.

 

The prevailing narrative in each country places full blame on the other side, and in each country there is a tendency to demonize, if not the other country, then its leaders. As national security issues dominate the dialogue, some of the mistrust and suspicions from the bitter Cold War struggle have reemerged. These feelings have been exacerbated in Russia by the memory of the first post-Soviet decade when Russia suffered a staggering socio-economic and political crisis, while the United States enjoyed its longest period of uninterrupted economic expansion. All this caused policy differences over the Balkans, the former Soviet territory, the Middle East, NATO expansion, missile defense and arms sales to overwhelm prospects for cooperation.

 

Perhaps most important has been a fundamental gap in historical conception. For the United States, the end of the Cold War seemed like a vindication of its traditional faith in inevitable democratic revolution. It visualized the expansion of an international system governed by essentially legal rules. But Russia’s historical experience is more complicated. To a country across which foreign armies have marched for centuries from both East and West, security will always need to have a geopolitical, as well as a legal, foundation. When its security border moves from the Elbe 1,000 miles east towards Moscow, Russia’s perception of world order will contain an inevitable strategic component. The challenge of our period is to merge the two perspectives—the legal and the geopolitical—in a coherent concept.

 

In this way, paradoxically, we find ourselves confronting anew an essentially philosophical problem. How does the United States work together with Russia, a country which does not share all its values but is an indispensable component of the international order? How does Russia exercise its security interests without raising alarms around its periphery and accumulating adversaries? Can Russia gain a respected place in global affairs with which the United States is comfortable? Can the United States pursue its values without being perceived as threatening to impose them? I will not attempt to propose answers to all these questions. My purpose is to encourage an effort to explore them.

 

Many commentators, both Russian and American, have rejected the possibility of the U.S. and Russia working cooperatively on a new international order. In their view, the United States and Russia have entered a new Cold War.

The danger today is less a return to military confrontation than the consolidation of a self-fulfilling prophecy in both countries. The long-term interests of both countries call for a world that transforms the contemporary turbulence and flux into a new equilibrium which is increasingly multipolar and globalized.

 

The nature of the turmoil is in itself unprecedented. Until quite recently, global international threats were identified with the accumulation of power by a dominating state. Today threats more frequently arise from the disintegration of state power and the growing number of ungoverned territories. This spreading power vacuum cannot be dealt with by any state, no matter how powerful, on an exclusively national basis. It requires sustained cooperation between the United States and Russia, and other major powers. Therefore the elements of competition, in dealing with the traditional conflicts in the interstate system, must be constrained so that the competition remains within bounds and creates conditions which prevent a recurrence.

 

There are, as we know, a number of divisive issues before us, Ukraine or Syria as the most immediate. For the past few years, our countries have engaged in episodic discussions of such matters without much notable progress. This is not surprising, because the discussions have taken place outside an agreed strategic framework. Each of the specific issues is an expression of a larger strategic one. Ukraine needs to be embedded in the structure of European and international security architecture in such a way that it serves as a bridge between Russia and the West, rather than as an outpost of either side. Regarding Syria, it is clear that the local and regional factions cannot find a solution on their own. Compatible U.S.-Russian efforts coordinated with other major powers could create a pattern for peaceful solutions in the Middle East and perhaps elsewhere.

 

Any effort to improve relations must include a dialogue about the emerging world order. What are the trends that are eroding the old order and shaping the new one? What challenges do the changes pose to both Russian and American national interests? What role does each country want to play in shaping that order, and what position can it reasonably and ultimately hope to occupy in that new order? How do we reconcile the very different concepts of world order that have evolved in Russia and the United States—and in other major powers—on the basis of historical experience? The goal should be to develop a strategic concept for U.S.-Russian relations within which the points of contention may be managed.

 

In the 1960s and 1970s, I perceived international relations as an essentially adversarial relationship between the United States and the Soviet Union. With the evolution of technology, a conception of strategic stability developed that the two countries could implement, even as their rivalry continued in other areas. The world has changed dramatically since then. In particular, in the emerging multipolar order, Russia should be perceived as an essential element of any new global equilibrium, not primarily as a threat to the United States.

 

I have spent the greater part of the past seventy years engaged in one way or another in U.S.-Russian relations. I have been at decision centers when alert levels have been raised, and at joint celebrations of diplomatic achievement. Our countries and the peoples of the world need a more durable prospect.

 

I am here to argue for the possibility of a dialogue that seeks to merge our futures rather than elaborate our conflicts. This requires respect by both sides of the vital values and interest of the other. These goals cannot be completed in what remains of the current administration. But neither should their pursuits be postponed for American domestic politics. It will only come with a willingness in both Washington and Moscow, in the White House and the Kremlin, to move beyond the grievances and sense of victimization to confront the larger challenges that face both of our countries in the years ahead.

 

Henry A. Kissinger served as national security advisor and secretary of state under Presidents Nixon and Ford. This speech was delivered as the Primakov lecture at the Gorchakov Foundation in Moscow.

 

 

 

 

Ovaj deo mi malko bode oči, konceptualno:

 

Perhaps most important has been a fundamental gap in historical conception. For the United States, the end of the Cold War seemed like a vindication of its traditional faith in inevitable democratic revolution. It visualized the expansion of an international system governed by essentially legal rules. But Russia’s historical experience is more complicated. To a country across which foreign armies have marched for centuries from both East and West, security will always need to have a geopolitical, as well as a legal, foundation.

Nema pravila bez "geopolitičke" (političke, real-političke, strateške, kakve god) dimenzije. Zašto Amerika može da se bavi samo pravnim normama - pa zato što je prethodno ponajviše udesila "geopolitičke" odnose prema svojim željama i prirodno želi da im da oreol legitimiteta i legaliteta, da ih učini univerzalnim i trajni(ji)m.

 

To važi za bilo koji politički faktor koji je u nekom istorijskom trenutku bio na vrhu piramide. Oni dole, malo ispod, ne dele uvek taj sentiment i zato moraju da se bave i "geopolitikom" a ne samo da poštuju norme. Što bi rekao Dominik Liven za, grubo, XIX vek - "naravno da su Britanci insistirali na pravilima, ako se igralo po pravilima Britanci su uvek pobeđivali".  :D

 

 

Inače je suštinski u pravu  - na širem planu, izazovi su zajednički.

[frn1782]

Super je ta prica o pravilima koja vazi samo dok ne iskrsne izuzetak koji ih potvrdjuje (99)

Moz da bude al ne mora da znaci.

Kisindzer tu malo farba ali realnost je uvek bila geopolitika za sve. Sve ostalo o "vrednostima" je samo ideoloska propaganda.

[Prospero]

Nije sve ideološka propaganda jer nisu svi isti, ali mi se svakako ne ulazi dalje u tu priču. Poenta mi je bila vrlo načelna i mehanička.