Basic Political Developments s12
Russia 111122
Basic Political Developments
· Presidents to discuss CIS structures' work - The presidents of CIS member states will hold an informal summit in Moscow on Dec. 20 to sum up the interim results of CIS executive bodies' work, Commonwealth Executive Committee Chairman and Executive Secretary Sergei Lebedev said.
· Euro.cz: Russian president may visit Prague on December 7-8 - Russian President Dmitry Medvedev will probably visit Prague on December 7-8, Euro.cz server has reported referring to unofficial sources and another source has also confirmed the date for CTK, but the Czech Presidential Office would not speak about the date as yet.
· Russia says new US sanctions on Iran unacceptable - Russian Foreign Ministry says US on Tehran's financial systems "contradictory to international law; US president says Washington will continue to look for ways to pressure Tehran over its nuclear program.
o Comment by Russian MFA Spokesman Alexander K. Lukashevich on new unilateral U.S. sanctions against Iran
· Russian companies unaffected by US sanctions against Iran - Russian companies have been unaffected by the new sanctions that the United States has slapped on Iran, says the official spokesman for the US Department of the Treasury in a telephone news briefing.
o Sanctions useless against Iran? - The Russian deputy foreign minister said that recent events resemble an attempt to bring about regime change. And according to Eland, that is what the West really wants, though it is not going to work.
· Putin wants to strengthen Russian-Polish relations - Vladimir Putin has congratulated Prime Minister Donald Tusk following the formation of a new coalition government in Warsaw last week.
· Will Russia pay Poland for Katyn? - Russia is preparing legislation which would rehabilitate the victims of the Katyn case of World War II. However, Russia’s latest attempt to distance itself from Stalin’s legacy will not resolve the contradictions in its relations with Poland.
· Russian FM in Chisinau to discuss effective cooperation in the CIS
o Moldova Anticipates 'More Intense Dialogue' With Russia Over Transdniester
· Price of Russian natural gas to go dn almost 50 pcnt for Belarus - Price of Russian natural gas will go down almost 50% for Belarus next year and will be tied up to Russia’s domestic prices as of 2013, the Moscow-based daily Vedomosti said Tuesday quoting its own well-informed sources.
· Tajikistan releases Russian pilots
o Russian, Estonian pilots released in Tajikistan - TV
· Astana hosts discussion on legal status of Caspian Sea - The 30th meeting of the Special Working Group for developing the Convention on the Legal Status of the Caspian Sea started Tuesday in Astana, the press service of Kazakh Foreign Ministry said.
Pacific Fleet warships convoying merchant ships in Gulf of Aden
· Two-way trade with Russia to double within four years - Viet Nam and Russia have agreed to double two-way trade to US$5 billion by 2015 thanks to significant steps in development of bilateral relations, which was lifted to a strategic partnership 10 years ago.
o UPDATE: Vietnam Signs Deal With Russia For $8 Bln Loan For Nuclear Plant
· [Macedonian] Minister Janakieski to sign railway cooperation agreement with Russia - The agreement promotes competitive international railway traffic through minimum interventions by the state, thus giving passengers with a greater choice of services, along with stimulation of countries' railway transporters to establish innovative and competitive prices of services, but also providing a higher degree of safety and security of railway traffic.
· Russia to resume importing meat from Mongolia
· Russian air-space defence to intercept all missiles – DM
· Military police will appear in Russia in 2012
· Russian Navy to receive 10 diesel submarines by 2020
· Space station crew land safely in Kazakhstan
· Russia is resigned to losing Mars moon probe
o Almost no chance left for Phobos-Grunt mission – Russia`s space agency
· Missile Strike Unlikely Against Wayward Russian Mars Probe - Russia probably isn’t capable of shooting down a wayward spacecraft with tons of toxic chemicals inside that may soon crash to Earth, U.S. space engineers said.
· Opposition plans to hold election day rally on Triumfalnaya Square
· About 250 international observers already accredited to monitor Duma elections
· ODIHR experts will not risk sharing fate of PACE delegation
· Dmitry Medvedev: "The slogan "We must stop feeding the Caucasus" is not fair, not right, and dangerous"
· For Russia's President, Calls For Violence On Line Not Protected Speech
· Medvedev proposes punishment for calls for violence on internet
· Russian patriarch awarded Order of Sheikh ul-Islam
· Patriarch Kirill to hold some meetings in the Moscow Kremlin - "The chambers are given to the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia for use by President of the Russian Federation Dmitry Medvedev and after restoration works are resumed they will be used for conducting official events with the Primate of the Russian Church, talks, receptions," the patriarchal press service reports.
Rub 3,7 bln spent on Vladivostok facades renovation for APEC 2012
· Putin party man beaten to death - Innokenti Buchin, a candidate for the town of Tikhvin in St. Petersburg's Leningrad region, was attacked in the home of a 39-year-old entrepreneur whose name was not revealed.
· Russian Press at a Glance, Tuesday, November 22, 2011
· A Russian epic for the box office, not a court in England - Week after week the case has opened a fascinating window on to the lives of the post-Soviet oligarchy, in particular that time when men of great drive and limited scruple garnered vast business empires as Russia was beset by rampant lawlessness.
· Filthy lucre: Afghan drug profits too juicy to resist - “Metaphorically speaking, instead of destroying the machine-gun nest, they suggest catching bullets flying from the machine-gun,” Ivanov explains. “We suggest eradicating the narcotic plants altogether. As long as there are opium poppy fields, there will be trafficking."
· Why are Russians excellent cybercriminals? - by Mark Galeotti
· Russia joins forces with France and Vietnam - Russian and French leaders have signed a wide-ranging declaration on nuclear energy cooperation as Russia's first foreign-equity nuclear power plant advances with a construction licence. Meanwhile, Russia also signed a credit agreement for another nuclear power plant in Vietnam.
National Economic Trends
· Banks have 668.8 bln rbs on CBR correspondent accounts on November 22.
· Russia Needs 0.5% Rate Cut to Protect Economy, Renaissance Says
· Russia to slash apple, pear import duties after joining WTO
Business, Energy or Environmental regulations or discussions
· Russia Stocks Rise First Day in Five After U.S. Rating Affirmed
· Bill on organized trade signed into law
· Kola GMK could finance Norilsk Nickel buyback with part of RUB 61 billion loan
· MMK mulls Flinders Mines acquisition, raising $100 mln loan (Part 2)
o MMK mulls $100m loan
o Russia's MMK mulls bid for Australia's Flinders
· Vozrozhdeniye Q3 net profit 411 mln rbls, below fcast
o Russian bank Vozrozhdenie says Kogan wants control
· Rostelecom to kick off stock option plan
· Alfa Bank President Aven Doubles His Stake in CTC Media, Vedomosti Reports
· Russia Acron 9M profit up on high fertiliser demand
Activity in the Oil and Gas sector (including regulatory)
· Companies aim to raise quality of oil products
· TNK-BP Vietnamese subsidary will invest $ 400 million in the county's wells
· Rosneft Issues Tender to Sell 540,000 Tons of CPC Blend Oil
· Alliance Oil sees IFRS earnings plummet 26% in Q3, below forecast (Part 2)
Gazprom
· Alexander Ananenkov and Kim Yong Jae discuss prospects for cooperation inenergy sector between Russia and North Korea
· UPDATE 1-Gazprom sees lower Q1 Europe consumer gas prices
· The Shtokman Field - Russia’s Gazprom owns 51% of the shares of the project, the French concern Total 25% and the Norwegian Statoil 24%. The three giants plan to implement the most advanced technologies in all phases of the project as well as guaranteeing security and the efficient management of all operations related to the field.
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Basic Political Developments
Presidents to discuss CIS structures' work
Today at 10:51 | Interfax-Ukraine
MOSCOW - The presidents of CIS member states will hold an informal summit in Moscow on Dec. 20 to sum up the interim results of CIS executive bodies' work, Commonwealth Executive Committee Chairman and Executive Secretary Sergei Lebedev said.
"Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has invited his counterparts to an informal summit to look back at what has been done by the executive structures of the Commonwealth in the past 20 years, as well as to outline prospects for the future," Lebedev said at a meeting of the highest-ranking officials of the CIS, the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), the Eurasian Economic Community (EurAsEC) and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) on Tuesday.
"The general vector of integration development within the CSTO format has been positive in 2011," including in the energy sector, transport and communication, he said.
"The main task of our meeting today is to improve the quality of work of our organizations' executive structures," Lebedev said.
Read more: http://www.kyivpost.com/news/russia/detail/117371/#ixzz1eQLGf61x
Euro.cz: Russian president may visit Prague on December 7-8
http://praguemonitor.com/2011/11/22/eurocz-russian-president-may-visit-prague-december-7-8
ČTK |
22 November 2011
Prague, Nov 21 (CTK) - Russian President Dmitry Medvedev will probably visit Prague on December 7-8, Euro.cz server has reported referring to unofficial sources and another source has also confirmed the date for CTK, but the Czech Presidential Office would not speak about the date as yet.
Moscow confirmed in October that Medvedev will go to Prague in December.
According to previous information, Medvedev is to attend the inauguration of an exhibition of unique items from the collections of Moscow's Kremlin. It is to feature 132 artifacts illustrating life in Russia in the 16th and 17th centuries.
The exhibition is to open on December 9 and last until March 4, 2012, according to previous information.
Medvedev has been invited to the Czech Republic by President Vaclav Klaus.
Klaus met Medvedev in Prague last year when he hosted a Russia-United States summit.
Medvedev and U.S. President Barack Obama signed a new U.S.-Russian nuclear arms reduction treaty.
During his visit to Prague, Medvedev is expected to discuss, for instance, a tender for the completion of the nuclear power plant in Temelin, south Bohemia, in which Russian Atomstroyexport is interested. It competes with the U.S. Westinghouse and the French Areva.
Copyright 2011 by the Czech News Agency (ČTK). All rights reserved.
Copying, dissemination or other publication of this article or parts thereof without the prior written consent of ČTK is expressly forbidden. The Prague Daily Monitor and Monitor CE are not responsible for its content.
Russia says new US sanctions on Iran unacceptable
http://www.jpost.com/IranianThreat/News/Article.aspx?id=246512
By REUTERS AND REBECCA ANNA STOIL, JPOST CORRESPON
11/22/2011 08:38
Russian Foreign Ministry says US on Tehran's financial systems "contradictory to international law; US president says Washington will continue to look for ways to pressure Tehran over its nuclear program.
Russia's Foreign Ministry denounced new US sanctions against Iran on Tuesday as "unacceptable and contradictory to international law," Interfax news agency reported.
The United States, worried by Tehran's nuclear program, named Iran on Monday as an area of "primary money laundering concern" in a step designed to dissuade non-US banks from dealing with it.
t also blacklisted 11 entities suspected of aiding its nuclear programs and expanded sanctions to target companies that aid its oil and petrochemical industries.
US President Barack Obama said Monday that the United States had identified "the entire Iranian banking sector -- including the Central Bank of Iran -- as a threat to governments or financial institutions that do business with Iranian banks."
Obama said Washington would continue to look for ways to pressure Tehran over its nuclear program.
"As long as Iran continues down this dangerous path, the United States will continue to find ways, both in concert with our partners and through our own actions to isolate and increase the pressure upon the Iranian regime," he said.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner made an official announcement on Monday afternoon detailing the series of new sanctions against Tehran, focusing on Iran’s money-raising activities.
Geithner declared the Central Bank of Iran to be a “primary money laundering concern,” a step short of official sanctions that would require the United States to cut off access to any foreign institution that does business with the bank. That more drastic step would have presented serious problems for US business if states such as China and Russia fail, as they are expected, to cut off ties with Tehran. The new category would simply worn off foreign governments and companies from dealing with Iranian institutions.
Clinton phoned Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu Monday evening to brief him on the sanctions the US decided to level against Iran.
The United Kingdom started off the trans-Atlantic sanctions announcements earlier Monday when the British government announced their decision to terminate all dealings with the Central Bank of Iran, a decision that covers all Iranian banks, branches and subsidiaries.
“This measure will protect the UK financial sector from being unknowingly used by Iranian banks for proliferation related transactions,” said George Osborne, Britain’s treasury chief.
Iran’s nuclear activities “pose a significant risk to the national interests of the UK and countries across the region.”
Since the November 8 publication of the IAEA’s report on Iran, the US has been pushing for international cooperation in policing Tehran’s nuclear production initiatives. Last week’s meeting of the nuclear watchdog organization’s board of governors yielded a statement calling on Iran to open itself to inspectors, but stopped short of major international steps against Tehran’s march toward nuclear armament.
Iranian representatives were conspicuously absent from a two-day meeting in Vienna held to discuss nuclear non-proliferation in the Middle East. In the shadow of the recent report slamming Iran’s nuclear aspirations, the IAEA hosted representatives of a number of Middle Eastern states, including Israel, for a discussion on creating a nuclear-weapon-free zone in the area.
There are already nuclearweapon- free zones in South America, Africa, the south Pacific and parts of Asia.
In addition to the nuclear faceoff and the terror plot targeting the Saudi ambassador to Washington, it looked Monday that there was yet another factor in Washington’s growing tensions with Iran.
The Washington Post revealed Monday that Iran was suspected of having provided former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi with hundreds of artillery shells filled with “highly toxic mustard agent.” These shells, discovered in recent sweeps of Libya by anti-Gaddafi forces, were beyond the purview of the minimal amounts of chemical agents that the US knew that Gaddafi held.
The Washington Post article quoted a senior US official as saying that the US “was pretty sure” that the shells were custom- designed and produced in Iran for Libya.
Washington is also concerned that more than a dozen undercover agents working for the CIA who were caught in both Iran and Lebanon will be or already have been executed, ABC News quoted US officials as saying on Monday.
According to the report, the agents were paid informants, hired by the CIA to spy on Iran and Hezbollah in Lebanon.
“Many risks lead to wins, but some result in occasional setbacks,” ABC quoted an official as saying. The arrests occurred over the past six months, he added.
The officials gave credit to Iran and Hezbollah for uncovering the two espionage rings, but say sloppy CIA “tradecraft” was also partly to blame for the discovery of the networks.
“We were lazy and the CIA is now flying blind against Hezbollah,” a former official was quoted as saying.
Herb Keinon and Jerusalem Post staff contributed to this report.