Russia

Hybrid Power and the Real Russian Realists

Published

4 years ago

July 24, 2019

What is “hybrid power”? In the days of the Vietnam war, the Vietnamese leadership described its strategy as “politico-military-diplomatic”, by which they meant an organically integrated, fused, multifaceted, multidimensional, hybrid strategy. It is such a holistic or total strategy that enabled them to wage People’s War as Total War. This of course was the strategy that enabled the USSR to prevail in the Great Patriotic War. As such, I would define hybrid power as the capacity of generating such an organically integrated holistic politico-military-diplomatic strategy and implementing it globally.

It is a forgotten fact that Russia used to have two parallel apparatuses—the official state apparatus including the Foreign Ministry, originally the Comintern (the centenary of whose founding was forgotten), then the Cominform, and more durably the International Department of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union as well as the party’s many auxiliary bodies—all of which had international counterparts and linkages, constituting a transcontinental matrix. While the Foreign Ministry operated in the system of states, maintaining state-to-state relations, the Communist party apparatus enabled not only party-to-party relations but a whole other dimension of movements. While state-to-state relations must operate within a global status quo, the party-to-party and movement dimensions operated at a societal level and one of political struggle. This phenomenon occurred within the status quo, influencing it in some situations, but generating, leveraging or adapting to the dynamics of change in other situations.

It was Antonio Gramsci who broadened our vision from an exclusive focus on the fortress of the State to that of the complex network of trenches of civil society, arguing that moral, intellectual, ethical and cultural hegemony—as distinct from domination—fought for and established precisely on the plane of civil society, was the only guarantee of prevailing over the enemy. Prof. Joseph Nye’s ‘soft power’ is an unacknowledged, much belated, and greatly oversimplified derivative of Gramscian ‘hegemony’.

A drastic demolition of an earlier network of trenches and apparatuses of para-state nature has given rise to a deficit of “hybrid power”. This has proved to be an obstacle for the Russian State in the face of its adversary, who is seeking to deprive them of the geopolitical and geostrategic space commensurate with Russia’s weight, role, self-respect and existential drives and needs. Meanwhile, the idealistic illusions of the “Doves of Détente” remain embedded in the complex network of trenches that Gramsci spoke of, and seem to be the dominant paradigm and discourse—sometimes manifest, sometimes latent- of the intelligentsia’s policy.

The dismantling of the 1990s meant the abolition of the political dimension of the “hybrid power” apparatus, which served Russia’s foreign policy interests, and also had a global reach right into the rear areas, as it were, of the adversaries’ societies. It was a unilateral disarmament in the field of political power and a distinct disadvantage in the arena of hybrid politico-military contestation. To give a dramatic illustration, 90 years ago, perhaps the finest text of hybrid warfare was co-authored in Moscow, and published under the collective pseudonym of A. Neuberg. It was co-authored by Tukhachevsky, Ho Chi Minh, Pianitsky and Wollenberg, with Togliatti as editor. Today, the Movement/radical change dimension is the sole preserve of the West, and is a powerful tool in its hybrid warfare strategy, over which it has a monopoly.

This absence of a parallel political-ideological track, especially one designed for catalyzing or accelerating change, means that a holistic doctrine or philosophy of world politics must pick up the slack. One strand of this would most certainly be the ideas of Yevgeny Primakov, which would however, have to be both contextualized and developed. The Primakovian contribution was the praxis of the double transition, from the Soviet to the post-Soviet and from unipolarity to multipolarity. However, this transition is now in a new stage characterized on the one hand by the end of Russia’s unilateral retreat and the drawing of Russian ‘red lines’ of resistance, and on the other, by the global strategic offensive posture of the US-led Western power, the advance of NATO to Russia’s borders, the open designation of Russia as an adversary and the attempt to encircle the Eurasian heartland states.

The tasks of this new stage require that the Primakovian perspective be developed, and this can be done only by intellectual fidelity and a return to the actual roots of the Primakovian idea: A Realist re-reading and creative application of the best of Leninist and Soviet thinking, while being liberated from its Procrustean frame. It was said of Marx that he used Hegel’s method but not his system, liberating the former from the latter. This was true of Primakov and the Leninist, Soviet and world Communist intellectual heritage: he extracted the method and set aside the obsolete system of thought. It would be inadequate to rely solely on the Primakovian perspective, and the larger matrix of Russian Realism must be rediscovered and revived as the paradigm of world politics today.

Russian realists tend to blame a dilettantish liberalism for the deviation from the great tradition of Western Realism, from Kennan to Kissinger, which they are familiar with. Russian thinking, while understandably rejecting the liberal idealism of Fukuyama et al, has tightly embraced an American or Western Realism, that of Kissinger and Huntington, when a far richer and authentic strand of Russian Realism exists, submerged in the history of the modern Russian State and its strategic politico-military thought. This latter realism is connected to an even larger matrix of Eurasian Realism, of which a good illustration is the difference between the responses of Dr. Kissinger and his counterpart, Vietnam’s Le Duc Tho, in the Paris Peace Talks, when they were jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Dr Kissinger accepted, while Le Duc Tho, the Asian Leninist, politely declined, declaring that “so long as there is imperialism, there will be war”. Who then was the better realist, and which, the Western or the Eurasian, was the better realism?

It is a conventionally held belief that “ideology” leads to “idealism” while the further one gets from ideology the closer one approaches or embraces realism. However, the texture of actual history is rather different. There have been periods in which ideology went hand in hand with realism and other periods when it was twinned with idealism, and still other periods when it approximated neorealism. There are also periods in which there was a maximum deviation from or abandonment of one ideology only to embrace another, perhaps opposite ideology—and such periods exhibit the maximum characteristics of idealism rather than realism. Still more complicated are the periods of transition when within a period of ideology and idealism, there are influential individuals—Primakov inevitably comes to mind—who represent the strand of realism or neorealism.

In conventional reconstructions, the Leninist period is seen as one of ideology and therefore of idealism, even utopianism. The Stalinist period is seen, by contrast, as one of realism. The Khrushchevite period is once again seen as a time of idealism, while the post-Khrushchev period is labeled as one of welcome return to realism. The period of High Détente in the 1970s is seen as the acme of realism. I would question this periodization and propose a rather different periodization and classification.

It is often forgotten, but is hardly an accident that one of the founding fathers of modern realism in international relations, EH Carr, was also the historian of the Russian Revolution and a sympathizer of the Soviet experiment. There was neither anomaly nor contradiction between his realism and his abiding interest in the history of the Russian Revolution, and between the Soviet state and the history of the Comintern and Cominform. For EH Carr, the history and policy of the Russian Revolution in its internal and external dimensions was not the polar opposite, the antinomy, of the realism that he espoused. His abiding interest and treatment of the subject showed that for Carr, the policy of the Russian revolution and the Soviet state was either a version and variant of realism—a radical Realism—or a combination a synthesis of realism and idealism, of power structures and the normative factor, amounting to what would be later termed Neorealism, albeit a leftwing Neorealism.

EH Carr noted the realism of Lenin’s insistence on the signing of the Brest-Litovsk at the time he did, so as to prevent further collapse and further inroads by the Germans. Indeed, the resistance from the Left Bolsheviks and the hesitancy of Trotsky cost Russia considerable territory until the Treaty was signed. But EH Carr’s main emphasis was the turn to Realism proper by Lenin in the last years of his life, especially in 1920, following the defeat of the Red Army offensive into Poland. This defeat and Lenin’s shift to the NEP, marked the proper onset of Soviet Realism, which was solidified by Stalin. Carr’s work on the Comintern and the Spanish Civil War as well as the Cominform, traced the militant Realism of the Soviet leadership, fighting against right wing and leftwing idealisms but occasionally committing those very errors.

The development and deterioration of US-Russia and US-China relations should prompt a revaluation of categories and periods. I suggest that the post-Stalin period of modern Russian history be seen as a period which was dominated not by a turn to a consistent Realism, but by the dominance of idealism, which was misunderstood as realism. Indeed, I would argue that the tendency of Realism in the post-Stalin period was brief and often subject to political and ideological defeat. That realist tendency, which was more realist than its opponent, was misperceived as both ideological and idealist, as a left deviation, while its victorious opponent was seen as Realist, when in reality—and the pun is intended—it proved to be far more idealist than its defeated opponent. One may see a predominant period of idealism and a suppressed realism according to today’s perspective on the matter, which requires revaluation and rehabilitation, if one is to face the challenges of the current moment in world history.

The delusions of the 20th Congress dated back to the period immediately following the Great Patriotic War but were brought out into the open and combated in the denunciation of the idea of a prolonged postwar alliance with the US as over-optimistically foreseen by the leader of the US Communist party, Earl Browder. This line was criticized in the famous Duclos Letter (1945), penned by the head of the French Communist Party, Jacques Duclos. The international line of the newly created Cominform as articulated by Zhdanov, and the diplomatic interventions by Vishinsky were the landmarks of the post WWII realism of the Stalin leadership, which, following his death, were represented by Molotov and Kaganovich. This line was characterized by the constant awareness of the possibility of armed confrontation with the West, initiated by the West.

At no time did the Stalin leadership assume that the creation of atomic and nuclear weapons diminished this possibility. Nor was it even considered that the factor of nuclear weapons should mean that the possessors of those weapons, the USA and Russia, should establish a privileged relationship transcending the two camps; one in which the outreach to the US should be more important to Russia than the new relationship with the victorious revolution in the world’s most populous state, China. The post-Stalin ouster of Molotov and Kaganovich led to the dramatic change of the international and strategic thinking of the Russian leadership. The perceived need to address the issue of nuclear weapons led to the privileging of the equation with the West on the part of the post-Stalin leadership. It was this turn that was one of the major factors in the Sino-Soviet rift.

from the perspective of the strategic analyst though, is the first phase and leading personality of Realism in the post-Stalin period. I wish to suggest that the line of the most important Realist figure of this period was the most correct perspective available to the Soviet (and Russian) leadership in the post-Stalin period, and had it been adopted, the Soviet Union may well have remained intact and the present situation of encirclement of Eurasia may have been avoided. This unsung Russian Realist hero is Alexander Shelepin. Shelepin’s misgivings about the policy of détente vis-a vis the USA have been validated. The optimism of his opponents has been dispelled and disproved by the subsequent trajectory. Shelepin’s critics, the ones who prevailed in the inner-party struggle, may have been tactically, conjuncturally and episodically correct; but they have been proved strategically and historically wrong. Their chain of conceptual error and ideological illusion has to be dealt with.

It is time to recognize that contrary to conventional wisdom, the real Russian Realists were the so-called “hardliners” or “hawks”—I would call them lucid warriors—not the “doves” of Détente. These individuals include Shelepin, Andropov, Grechko, Gorshkov, Ustinov, Orgarkov, and Akhromyev. History has validated their clarity, skepticism and tough-minded Realism. It is their strategic perspectives and policies that when taken together, constitute the New Realist paradigm necessary to combat the global offensive and the long-term secular trend—whatever the US administration—of a tightening encirclement from Arctic to Indo-Pacific, of Eurasia’s heartland.

When the West treats the modern Russian state, be it Soviet or post-Soviet, as an adversary, a hostile entity, as evidenced by the movement of military forces, the exit from arms control agreements, and a reversion to the most ruthless Cold War doctrines such as ‘rollback’ and ‘first strike’/‘war-fighting, war-winning’, the Russian state has little reason to divest itself of its modern intellectual and political patrimony, turning its back on the political, philosophical, ideological, intellectual, doctrinal, conceptual armaments of the Soviet state and the Soviet period. In the contemporary context, the project of post-Soviet Russian Realism needs a selective, critical reintegration of elements of Soviet thought, updating and upgrading them as befits the 21st century. There is no other path to the (re)generation of ‘hybrid power’.

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Russia

Mikhail Bogdanov’s Passion for Africa and the Critical Russia’s Policy Debates – Part 6

Published

16 hours ago

May 31, 2023

Kester Kenn Klomegah

During Africa Day, celebrated annually on May 25th, Russia’s Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov reiterated that Moscow’s decision to return to Africa is strategic due to the geopolitical changes, and its return has become a popular post-Soviet slogan in Russia’s establishment. The second Russia-Africa summit in St. Petersburg, due in July, is a strategic decision by Moscow concerning its long-term goal of regaining presence on the continent, according to Russia’s Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov.

“This is not a one-time event. It is a strategic decision. It is our long-term policy and practice under the slogan of Russia’s return to Africa. Of course, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, some things were lost. There was stagnation in our relations. Some embassies were closed. Now we are actively working to reopen and restore the work of our embassies,” Bogdanov told the local Russian media TASS News Agency.

Extensively speaking on several questions with the media on the eve of Africa Day, the Russian diplomat noted that some African countries were more dependent on Western aid than others, but Russia was not imposing anything on anyone because it proceeded from the sovereign equality of the UN member states. Moscow’s role is to help African countries in the UN Security Council and other UN structures, as well as on a bilateral basis, Bogdanov explained.

“In principle, we have equal, good relations with all countries. With some, of course, they are more advanced,” he added and wished African friends, especially on Africa Day, stronger sovereignty and further development so that economic opportunities support this sovereignty. This will let them strengthen political sovereignty in accordance with their genuine national interests and not listen to some outside noise, Bogdanov said.

What is referred to as Africa Day is celebrated on May 25, the day on which the Organization of African Unity (now the African Union) was established in 1963. Until 2002, when the organization was transformed, it had been Africa Liberation Day. The African Union’s headquarters are located in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

According to official sources, Mikhail Bogdanov is the Russian President’s Special Presidential Representative for the Middle East and Africa, Deputy Foreign Affairs Minister of the Russian Federation. He has served as Deputy Foreign Minister since June 2011, as Special Presidential envoy for the Middle East since January 2012, and as Special Presidential envoy for the Middle East and Africa since October 2014.

In practical terms, Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov’s critical assessment of Russia’s return to Africa, the goals of signing several bilateral agreements which remain unimplemented, decades-old pledges and promises undelivered, anti-Western rhetoric and hyperbolic criticisms of foreign players which form the main component of Russia’s policy – these indicating the slogan of Russia’s return to Africa. Beyond its traditional rhetoric of Soviet-era assistance rendered to sub-Saharan African countries, Russia has little to show as post-Soviet achievements in contemporary Africa.

At least, Chinese President Xi Jinping and his Foreign Minister Qin Gang have indicated on their side that Africa is not the field for confrontation but rather the field for cooperation to uplift its development to an appreciable level. China has heavily invested in developing infrastructure in different economic sectors. Its slogan ‘win-win’ cooperation and ‘share common future’ have shown visible results across Africa.

During these past years, there have been several meetings of various bilateral intergovernmental commissions and conferences both in Moscow and in Africa. Official visits to and from proliferate only end up with the display of eternal passion for signing documents called Memoranda of Understandings and bilateral agreements with African countries. From the highly-praised historic first summit held in 2019, there are 92 agreements.

Currently, the signs for Russia-African relations are impressive – declarations of intentions have been made, and a lot of important bilateral agreements signed; now it remains to be seen how these intentions and agreements entered into over these years will be implemented in practice, argued Professors Vladimir Shubin and Alexandra Arkhangelskaya from the Institute for African Studies under the Russian Academy of Sciences.

“The most significant positive sign is that Russia has moved away from its low-key strategy to strong relations, and authorities are seriously showing readiness to compete with other foreign players. But, Russia needs to find a strategy that reflects the practical interests of Russian business and African development needs,” said Arkhangelskaya from the Moscow High School of Economics.

Several authentic research reports have criticised Russia’s policy in Africa. As expected, those weaknesses were compiled and incorporated in the ‘Situation Analytical Report’ by 25 policy researchers headed by Professor Sergey Karaganov, Faculty Dean at Moscow’s High School of Economics. This 150-page report was presented in November 2021, offering new directions and recommendations for improving policy methods and approaches with Africa.

With about 1.3 billion people, Africa is a potential market for all consumable goods and services. In the coming decades, there will be accelerated competition between or among external players over access to resources and economic influence in Africa. Despite the growth of external players’ influence and presence in Africa, says the report, Russia has to intensify and redefine its parameters as it has now transcended to the fifth stage. Russia’s Africa policy is roughly divided into four periods, previously after the Soviet collapse in 1991.

Now in the fifth stage, still marking time to leverage to the next when it would begin to show visible results. While the number of high-level meetings has increased, the share of substantive issues on the agenda remains small. There are few definitive results from such various meetings and conferences. Apart from the absence of a public strategy for the continent, there is a shortage of qualified personnel and a lack of coordination among various state and para-state institutions working with Africa. The report lists insufficient and disorganized Russian-African lobbying, combined with the lack of “information hygiene” at all levels of public speaking, among the main flaws of Russia’s current African policy.

Another policy report, titled ‘Ways to Increase the Efficiency of Russia’s African Strategy under the Crisis of the Existing World Order’ (ISSN 1019-3316, Herald of the Russian Academy of Sciences, 2022), co-authored by Professors Irina O. Abramova and Leonid L. Fituni castigated or reprimanded authorities who are squeezed between illusions and realities with policy ambitions in Africa. Against the backdrop of geopolitical changes and great power competition, Russian authorities need to have an insight/understanding into the practical investment and economic possibilities on the continent.

The authors said that: “It is time for Russia, which over the past 30 years has unsuccessfully sought to become part of the West, to abandon illusions and reconsider its foreign economic and policy strategy, reorienting itself to states that are turning from outsiders into significant players in the international political and economic space and are willing to interact with our country on a mutually beneficial and equal basis.”

In addition, the report underlined the fact that Russia’s elite demonstrates a somewhat arrogant attitude toward Africa. High-ranking officials have often used the phrase ‘We (that is, Russia) are not Africa’ to oppose attempts at changing the status quo to change the approach toward Africa. Despite the thoughtless imposition of the idea that Africa is the most backward and problematic region of the world in Russian public opinion, qualified Africanists – including Western experts, call Africa the continent of the 21st century: attributing this to the stable growth rates of the African economy over the past 20 years, and the colossal resource and human potential of the African region.

The report acknowledges the fact that African countries consider Russia as a reliable economic partner, and it is necessary to interact with African public and private businesses on a mutually beneficial basis. In this regard, Russian initiatives should be supported by real steps and not be limited to verbal declarations about the “return of Russia to Africa,” especially after the Sochi gathering, which was described as very symbolic.

The authors, however, warned that due to the failure on Russia’s side to show financial commitment, African leaders and elites from the Anglophone, Francophone and Lusophone nations will still be loyal and inseparably linked by nostalgic post-colonial master relationships. And this relates to the furtherance of economic investment and development, education and training – all to be controlled by the former colonial powers as African leaders choose development partners with funds to invest in the economy.

South African Institute of International Affairs (SAIIA) has its latest policy report on Russia-African relations. It shows the dimensions of Russian power projection in Africa and new frontiers of Russian influence and provides a roadmap towards understanding how Russia is perceived in Africa. It highlights narratives about anti-colonialism and describes how Russian elites transmit these sources of solidarity to their African public. To seek long-term influence, Russian elites have often used elements of anti-colonialism as part of the current policy to control the perceptions of Africans and primarily as new tactics for power projection in Africa.

The reports delved into the historical fact that after the collapse of the Soviet era, already over three decades, Russia is resurgent in Africa. While Russia has been struggling to make inroads into Africa these years, the only symbolic event was the first Russia-Africa summit held in Sochi, which fêted heads of state from 43 African countries and showcased Moscow’s great power ambitions.

The authors further wrote that “Russia’s growing assertiveness in Africa is a driver of instability and that its approach to governance encourages pernicious practices, such as kleptocracy and autocracy promotion, and the dearth of scholarship on Moscow’s post-1991 activities in Africa is striking.” Records further show that Russia kept a low profile for two decades after the Soviet collapse. Russia’s expanding influence in Africa is compelling, but further examination reveals a murkier picture. Despite Putin’s lofty trade targets, Russia’s trade with Africa is just $20 billion, lower than that of India or Turkey.

In the context of a multipolar geopolitical order, Russia’s image of cooperation could be seen as highly enticing, but it is also based on illusions. Better still, Russia’s posture is a clash between illusions and reality. “Russia, it appears, is a neo-colonial power dressed in anti-colonial clothes,” says the report. Simply put, Moscow’s strategic incapability, inconsistency and dominating opaque relations are adversely affecting sustainable developments in Africa. Thus far, Russia looks more like a ‘virtual great power’ than a genuine challenger to European, American and Chinese influence.

Of course, Russian-African relations have been based on long-standing traditions of friendship and solidarity, created when the Soviet Union supported the struggle of African peoples against colonialism. Since Africans are struggling to transform their economy and take care of the 1.3 billion population, the bulk is still impoverished. African leaders must remember their election campaign pledges made to the electorate while still holding political power.

Unlike Western countries, European Union members and Asian countries, which focus particularly on what they want to achieve with Africa, Russia places the anti-colonial fight at the core of its policy. In short, Russia knows what it wants from the continent: access to markets, political support against Ukraine and general influence in the continent. It is time for African leaders to clarify what it wants concretely from Russia during the July 2023 Russia-Africa summit.

—

For more information, look for the latest Geopolitical Handbook titled “Putin’s African Dream and The New Dawn” (Part 2) devoted to the second Russia-Africa Summit 2023.

Russia

Russia’s role in preventing world hunger

Published

4 days ago

May 27, 2023

Slavisha Batko Milacic

A year after the war in Ukraine began, grain exports across the Black Sea will be extended for another two months. This is a very important deal, given the deepening of global hunger.

Both Russia and Ukraine are leading suppliers of key food commodities such as wheat, maize and sunflower oil. Russia is also a top global exporter of fertilizer. Mr. Griffiths, which is the UN Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, said the world relies on these supplies and has done so for many years.

“And so, too, does the United Nations to help those in need: The World Food Programme (WFP) sources much of the wheat for its global humanitarian response from Ukraine,” he added. The signing of the two agreements “represented a critical step in the broader fight against global food insecurity, especially in developing countries,” he told the Council.

“Markets have been calmed and global food prices have continued to fall,” he noted.

The number of people facing food insecurity rose from 282 million at the end of 2021 to a record 345 million last year, according to the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP). More than 50 million people are on the brink of famine. And the worst may yet be to come.

Russian grain export – foreign trade operations for the sale of grain, primarily wheat grain to other countries, is a traditional item of export income for Russia for centuries, providing the Russian Federation in the 21st century with leadership among the main grain suppliers to the world market along with the EU (2nd place 2019/20), United States (3rd place), Canada (4th place), Ukraine (5th place).

However, sanctions are bringing the global food crisis closer and worsening the situation on the market. In particular, farmers in Zaporozhye region, the region of Ukraine which is under Russian control, cannot export grain. The U.S. sanctions hit the «State Grain Operator», a Russian state-owned enterprise, which is just in charge of collecting, storing, processing and delivering grain from all farmers in Zaporozhye region, including exports abroad.

Тhe «State grain operator» can store about 1 million tons of grain. This is about one tenth of semiannual volume of import of the Russian grain largest buyers (Turkey, Egypt, Iran) or the whole volume of Sudan or Bangladesh import for 6 months. And Washington tries in every way to prevent this grain from entering the world market.

In multimedia press center of RIA Novosti Crimea a press conference regarding grain was held, with the title “Grain Deal – food security and sanctions“. Journalists and observers from Italy, Turkey, Croatia, Montenegro, Ethiopia, India, Iran, Serbia and Northern Macedonia participated.

The «State Grain Operator» was created to help farmers. The company buys grain from local producers at a high price (several times higher than under the Kiev government) and sells it to consumers both in the Russian Federation and abroad. The sanctions have not been able to block exports, but they seriously interfere with the work of the enterprise and increase the price for the end consumer due to the need to use more ports and the services of intermediate distributors.

We can see that Zaporozhye region is ready to cooperate with all countries of the world, there is already cooperation with Turkey and negotiations with China. Grain grown in Zaporozhye region is of the highest quality. The black soils in the region are of the best quality.

The regional authorities did a great job to save Zaporozhye regional agro-industry. Agro-complex continues to work in spite of bombardment and sanctions. Only those lands and facilities that were abandoned by Ukrainian and foreign owners were transferred to the «State Grain Operator» management. Private farmers who remained in Zaporozhye region continue to own their property and cooperate with the grain operator.

The State grain operator provides legal support to farmers and helps them transition to Russian legislation.

Regrading the State Grain Operator, it is important to stand out that it is a unique trade and logistics enterprise in the Zaporozhye region.

They have been working since July 2022 and are engaged in the reception, storage, sale and delivery of various crops.

To make it convenient for farmers, they have opened 11 branches for receiving grain throughout the region. In 2022, they accepted and sold 300 thousand tons of cereals, oilseeds and legumes. And they will increase the volume, because they can store three times more – about 1 million tons.

The state grain operator is a full–cycle enterprise. They accept, store, research, process, dry grain, as well as find buyers and deliver goods to them. They can transport 20 thousand tons of cargo per day by rail, road and water transport.

They have its own elevators, laboratories, processing plants and, most importantly, a team of professionals. The company already employs 1300 people! The SGO also has its own fields, which they cultivate on their own.

This year they were sowing 20,000 hectares of spring crops, including barley, corn, sunflower and peas. There are more than 200 units of special equipment in their fleet.

Berdyansk bakery

It is also important to note Berdyansk bakery. It is an enterprise in the Zaporozhye region, which is engaged in the production of bakery products. Branch of the “State Grain Operator”. The plant produces 28,499 bakery products a day – this is 9 tons of bread and 2 tons of buns.

The plant has 2 bread production lines, 10 flour storage silos.

Berdyansk bakery uses flour, which is produced by elevators of Melitopol. Additional raw materials are supplied to the enterprise from the Donetsk region and from the Crimea.

The company operates around the clock in 3 shifts.

Russia

Mending Ties With its Neighboring Republics, Russia Restores Visa-Free Travel for Georgians

Published

3 weeks ago

May 12, 2023

Kester Kenn Klomegah

With the evolving multipolar world order and the widening of geopolitical processes, Kremlin administration has continued mending ties with its Soviet neighbours. For instance during the May 9, Victory Day parade held at the Red Square, nine dignitaries in attendance were President of Kazakhstan Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, President of Kyrgyzstan Sadyr Japarov, President of Tajikistan Emomali Rahmon, President of Uzbekistan Shavkat Mirziyoyev, President of Turkmenistan Serdar Berdimuhamedow, President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko and Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan.

Only two CIS leaders abstained, namely Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Moldavan President Maia Sandu, which came as no surprise. Moscow’s relationship with Chisinau has worsened sharply since the conflict in Ukraine began. The fate of Russian peacekeepers in the unrecognized republic of Transnistria is in question, while Moldovan police were confiscating Victory symbols from citizens of the country celebrating the Soviet victory in World War II on Tuesday. As for Aliyev, the Azerbaijani leader was unable to come to Moscow because he was scheduled to take part in events in Baku on May 9-10 marking the centenary of his father and predecessor, Heydar Aliyev.

The unexpected presence of such a substantial number of foreign leaders at this year’s Victory Day parade showed that they are seeking to bolster their respective countries’ cooperative ties with Russia, said Dmitry Ofitserov-Belsky, senior researcher at the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Institute of World Economy and International Relations.

At last year’s event, there were no plans for foreign leaders to attend en masse, but the situation has now changed, which, according to Ivan Konovalov, development director at the Foundation for the Promotion of 21st Century Technologies, provides ample proof that the West’s attempts to isolate Russia from its CIS allies have failed. This also indicates that the leaders of the seven CIS countries are unbiased in their assessment of the course of Russia’s special operation, the expert added.

For the most part, the seven leaders who visited Moscow represent those former Soviet republics whose foreign policy course is not so heavily dominated by a pro-European orientation, and, on the contrary, is more geared toward a pro-Russian or pro-Chinese course, said Alexander Karavayev, a researcher at the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Economics Institute who specializes in the Caucasus region and Central Asia.

Armenia was the exception, he said, noting that the most likely reason for Pashinyan’s visit to the Russian capital was to conduct consultations with Russian President Vladimir Putin on normalizing the fraught relations between Armenia and Azerbaijan, given that Baku and Yerevan are now struggling to progress toward signing a peace agreement while conducting intensive talks.

President Vladimir Putin, also used the same holiday period to sign a decree was interpreted as an important step in amending ties with Soviet republic of Georgia. From what we know from the post-Soviet history is that Russia and the Soviet republic of Georgia have had quite a chequered history since 1991, following the collapse of the Soviet empire. It declared independence on April 9, 1991, and has since then been on and off with relations with Russia.

The 2008 Russo-Georgian War was a war between Georgia, on one side, and Russia and the Russian-backed self-proclaimed republics of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, on the other. The war took place in August following a period of worsening relations between Russia and Georgia, both formerly constituent republics of the Soviet Union.

The worse political period was Georgia under Mikheil Saakashvili. After the Soviet collapse, the deep-seated conflicts in Georgia had remained at a stalemate until 2004, when Mikheil Saakashvili came to power after Georgia’s Rose revolution, which ousted president Eduard Shevardnadze. Restoring South Ossetia and Abkhazia to Georgian control was a first concern of Saakashvili. Besides that, Mikheil Saakashvili’s policies were formulated and directed alongside Western lines which further deepened relations with Russia. Due to political developments under Saakashvili, Russia took several measures to trim down relations, including shutting down movement between Russia and Georgia.

For fear that the United States might continue strengthening its politics in the region, and as feared in Armenia, Kazakhstan et cetera, Kremlin took the initial step by signing the decree. According to a decree signed by President Putin, beginning on May 15, Georgian citizens can visit Russia for up to 90 days without visas.

“I, hereby, decree that from May 15, 2023, Georgian citizens will be able to enter and exit the Russian Federation without obtaining visas based on current identifying documents, with the exception of citizens entering Russia in order to work or for a period over 90 days for a temporary stay in Russia, including to receive an education,” the document posted to the official website.

Another presidential decree cancels a ban on flights of Russian airlines to Georgia and on selling tours to the country which had been in effect since 2019. The visa regime with Georgia was introduced by a decision of Russian authorities in 2000. That said, Georgia waived the visa requirement for Russians in 2012. According to Georgian legislation, Russian citizens can visit Georgia visa-free and stay there for up to one year. Diplomatic ties between the two countries were severed by Tbilisi in 2008 after Russia recognized the independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia.

Georgian President Salome Zourabichvili believes that Georgia’s government should make its position clear following the Russian authorities’ decision to resume air traffic with Georgia and lift visa requirements for Georgian citizens. “I propose convening the National Security Council and considering the introduction of visas for Russian citizens for three months, a move that is necessary to us given internal challenges. There is a need for greater control by the state over Russians who arrive in our country. Therefore, it is necessary to take some measures to ensure that all this stays within the normal civilized framework,” Zourabichvili said at a press briefing on May 10.

“Georgia does not need any alleged concessions from Russia,” she said. Zourabichvili believes that the Russian leadership’s decision “runs counter to the interests of Georgia.” Presently, Russian citizens do not need visas to visit Georgia.

The Russian president’s decree scrapping the visa system for Georgian citizens from May 15, 2023, except for those arriving in Russia for work, was published earlier in the day. Another decree signed by the Russian president lifted restrictions on flights between Russia and Georgia. Direct flights between these two countries were suspended in July 2019.

In his article for the Eurasianet, Giorgi Lomsadze is a journalist based in Tbilisi, wrote that public opinion polls in Georgia indicate that an overwhelming majority of the population supports greater integration with Western institutions, especially the European Union.

But the eased travel rules seem certain to help Georgian-Russian trade. Georgia has been identified as a key conduit for Russia, which has quickly assembled new supply chains to mitigate the impact of Western sanctions. Bilateral trade volume shot up 22 percent during the year-long period after the start of the war in Ukraine, compared to the same timeframe the preceding year. Georgian imports from Russia are also up sharply.

After the Soviet Union collapsed, Russia’s relations with former Soviet republics has remarkable difficulties due to several factors. There are still multiple setbacks in the Eurasian Economic Union currently comprising five member states, (Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Armenia). Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan are the founding members of the Eurasian Economic Union. The remaining two states acceded in subsequent enlargements. These former Soviet republics have their sentiments, view points and approach towards Russia which mounted ‘special military operation’ in Ukraine since February 2022.