Not an ultimatum, but an offensive. President’s power is not unlimited. Who is the hero for the minister?
December 22, 2021
Not an ultimatum, but an offensive
In Moscow, a meeting of the enlarged board of the Defense Ministry was held, where President Putin made his traditional speech. In his keynote address, Putin stated that…
“If our Western colleagues continue their clearly aggressive line, we will take adequate military and technical responses, and we will respond to unfriendly steps in a tough manner. And, I want to emphasize, we have every right to do so; we have every right to act ensuring the security and sovereignty of Russia.”
Thinking that this might not be enough, Putin gave a detailed commentary on “Our treaties and agreements, which were sent to the leaders of the United States and NATO on issues of strategic stability”.
“We see already what some of our detractors interpret as an ultimatum from Russia. Is this an ultimatum or not? Of course not.”
To begin with, the Russian President reiterated his set of grievances against the United States:
“Everything that the United States has done...ensuring its interests supposedly and supposedly its security thousands of kilometers away from its national territory...such harsh and most vivid things, without any authorization from the UN Security Council.
“Yugoslavia was bombed under what pretext? What, with the sanction of the Security Council, or what? Where is Yugoslavia, and where is the United States? They destroyed the country…
“And under what pretext did they enter Iraq? The development of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. They went in, destroyed the country, created a hotbed of international terrorism. And then it turned out they were mistaken, and then they said, ‘The intelligence fails us.’ Wow!...
“How did you get into Syria? With the authorization of the Security Council? No. Whatever they want, that’s what they do…”
Following that, Putin voiced his main grievance, explained what frightened him, and issued an ominous warning:
“...what they are doing now in Ukraine or are trying to do and are planning to do...is on our doorstep.
“They will supply Ukraine with hypersonic weapons, and then under its cover... they will arm and push extremists from a neighboring state into Russia, including some areas of the Russian Federation, say Crimea, under circumstances that they believe are beneficial to them.
“Do they think we don’t see these threats?
“They must realize that we simply have nowhere else to retreat to.”
Apparently, after this, Washington should understand that Russia has not issued an ultimatum but has gone on the offensive.
Russian statisticians are the best!
The experts of the Bank of Russia published a critical analysis of the practice of revising Rosstat data on the dynamics of GDP for the period from 2005 to 2021.
Revision of the data on the economic dynamics is the standard practice of the statistical agencies. Initial estimates published a few weeks after the end of the quarter are based on incomplete data. The report notes that “international experience also shows that initial estimates of GDP in many countries (except for the United States) are somewhat understated and revised upward over time.” In this regard, Rosstat is not out of the general trend—its subsequent estimates give a higher result.
However, the Bank of Russia experts have shown that Rosstat’s revisions are on average much more upwardly biased than those of other countries. Especially strong, they noted, “are characteristic of crisis periods, when the adoption of a timely and appropriate balance of risks for the economy and financial stability becomes especially important.”
Public debate about the quality of Russian statistics is not welcomed by the Kremlin, especially when it involves government agencies. In this case, the disclaimer that the experts’ point of view does not reflect the Bank of Russia allows us to circumvent this prohibition. But whether the reason for the excessive optimism of Russian statistics lies in incomplete primary data, due to the large share of the shadow economy, or in political pressure remains a mystery.
There is no gas. No one to blame either
Due to cold weather and increased demand, there is a new upsurge in prices on the European gas market—spot prices have exceeded $2,000/1,000 cub.m. Gazprom continues to stand in the position of a silent observer, refusing to sell gas on its spot-market trading platform with delivery in the coming days.
Information that gas deliveries to Germany by the Yamal-Europe pipeline via Poland and Belarus had ceased and that the pipeline was operating in reverse mode, moving gas from Germany to Poland, again aroused suspicions of the Russian monopoly’s behavior. But they were quickly dispelled by Poland’s PGNiG: “... the contract [for Gazprom’s gas supply] is being fulfilled. We have no complaints.”
Earlier, at Poland’s request, the European Commission launched an investigation and is not yet ready to draw conclusions as to whether Gazprom is abusing the rules of the European energy market. As the executive vice-president of the Euro commission, Margrethe Vestager, said, there are currently no clearly formulated claims; the investigation is at the stage of gathering information.
“... we have begun to ask questions of all the major energy sector companies in Europe, particularly Gazprom, to get a good understanding of whether there are current abuses in the energy market. It is too early to draw conclusions at this stage... We are still gathering information and analyzing it.”
COVID news
The situation with the coronavirus in Moscow is calm, the COVID-19 incidence rate has dropped by two-thirds from its previous peak, and the number of hospitalizations of sick patients has halved, the capital’s mayor, Sergei Sobyanin, said. According to him, during the past week, the rate of the disease decreased by 12%, which indicates a good trend.
To all appearances, the surge of cases in Moscow, about which I spoke last week, was connected to the base effect, a small number of tests on specific dates.
Only 41 cases of the Omicron variant were detected in Russia, and the current statistics confirm that the new variant has not arrived in Russia yet.
China looks attractive
Sberbank, the biggest bank in Russia, plans to launch instant monetary transfers by cell phone to China in 2022 in partnership with Chinese Alipay, said Kirill Tsarev, deputy chairman of the bank. According to him, Sberbank expects that the movement of visitors between Russia and China, reduced due to the pandemic, will recover, boosting the demand for Sberbank’s services.
Sberbank now provides instant cross-border transfers to nine countries.
President’s power is not unlimited
In October, Sergei Zuev, rector of the Moscow Higher School of Social and Economic Sciences (Shanin’s School) and director of the Institute of Social Sciences of the Russian Academy of National Economy and Public Administration, was detained in Moscow. He was accused of participating in the fraud connected with fulfilling a state contract. Initially, he was put under house arrest by the court, but later the prosecutor’s office sought to have him transferred to custody for the investigation period. Former Russian Deputy Minister of Education Marina Rakova and three other people were also arrested as part of the same charges.
Before his arrest, Zuev underwent his third heart surgery in a year; he has dependent elderly parents with disabilities and two children, including one with autism. Hundreds of Russian scientists, and Russian human rights ombudswoman Tatyana Moskalkova, have requested his release from prison while the investigation is pending. Two weeks ago, President Vladimir Putin told members of the Human Rights Council that he saw no need to detain Zuev.
Despite this, the Moscow City Court upheld Zuev’s arrest, extending it until March 7.
On Thursday, December 23, Vladimir Putin will hold his next press conference, at which he will definitely get a question about Zuev’s fate. It seems that once again, we will hear that “Russian courts are independent of the President, and the President cannot interfere in the work of the investigative authorities.