On May 16, Valdai International Discussion Club held a round-table discussion «Russia and the West: new stage of relationship». The framework of the round table also included a presentation of the Russian edition of Alexander Rahr’s book Where Will Putin Go? Russia Between China and Europe (original title Der kalte Freund. Warum wir Russland brauchen: Die Insider-Analyse).
Following up on the Moscow conference on missile defense and ahead of the NATO summit in Chicago the Valdai Discussion Club convened foreign and Russian experts to discuss the future of Russia-NATO relations.
The fifth conference of the Working Group on the future of Russian-U.S. relations is to be held on May 17 - 20 in Moscow.
The theses contained in the report “Russia should not miss its chance: Development scenarios” were prepared by the working group comprising Russian and international experts ahead of the VIII annual Valdai Discussion Club meeting, themed “2011-2012 Elections and the Future of Russia. Development Scenarios for the Next 5-8 Years”.
The Valdai Index represents the combined opinion of leading world experts that participated in Valdai Club conferences with respect to Russia’s development in the political, economic, social, cultural and international spheres. Download Russia Development Index 2010-2011 in Russian (PDF)
The report examines how the Russia’s and United States` ties with the countries in post-Soviet Eurasia affect the bilateral relationship. The authors argue that despite the initial successes of the “reset” in Russia-U.S. relations, disputes relating to post-Soviet Eurasia represent “a ‘landmine’ in Russia -U.S. relations that could ‘detonate’ at any time and seriously complicate cooperation on other issues.
The modernization of Russia's Caspian Flotilla triggered the naval arms race in the Caspian Sea. There is no reason whatsoever to be concerned about the strength of Russia’s military positions in the Caspian region. The likelihood of a Russian-Azerbaijani sea conflict seems very remote.
The wind of change must be blowing somewhere near Moldova. There have been changes in the leadership of the self-proclaimed Trans-Dniester Republic, which retains its sovereignty thanks largely to Russia’s support. And those changes have come as a complete surprise to Moscow.
A realistic appraisal of the situation suggests that Russia and Georgia will continue to enlarge the sphere of their mutually productive relations outside the knot of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, without setting as a precondition that the other side formally surrender their principled position on the status of these two long-troubled regions.
Nostalgic and psychological aspirations of the Russian leaders for re-integrating post-Soviet space are rather strong and will play a major role within the next six or twelve years. CIS countries may decide to join the Eurasian Union and will try to receive as many economic and financial perks from Russia as possible, in particular, on prices on gas and other energy sources.
Russian language is present in Ukraine in everyday life. Kiev remains a largely Russian-speaking city, and of course the south and east of Ukraine will probably remain Russian-speaking. But the Ukrainian language will become more and more relevant throughout the country, and eventually Ukraine will probably end up being a properly bilingual and partly trilingual country
Russian has official status as a state language in only one country outside the Russian Federation, which is Belarus, and two unrecognized states, which are South Ossetia and Abkhazia. All other countries prefer not to use Russian as an official language, including Ukraine.
As long as Viktor Yanukovych’s team is in power, the only goal of European policy towards Ukraine will be to prevent any rapprochement with Russia. In particular, Europe does not want Ukraine to cede control of its gas transportation system to Russia or to join the Customs Union of Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan.
On May 7, a few hours after his presidential inauguration, Vladimir Putin signed a decree for a strategic program on the development of Russian education. One of its chief aims is to ensure that a number of Russian universities enter the ranking of the world’s top 100 universities.
The aim of the protests was quite simple. The political process behind the demonstrations against Vladimir Putin and for fair elections has now become irreversibly transformed into a technological one.
For Washington, Putin’s doubts about the G-8’s capacity to accomplish anything significant and his close relations with China should turn on the red light with regards to the hallowed U.S.-Russian “reset” policy.
In the Muslim community in Russia actual religious and spiritual problems are fading into the background, while the clergy are focused on fighting for leadership and their own financial wellbeing.
