Plagiarism that pleases. To thank him. War on teenagers. There is no solution to one problem without the second
February 11, 2022
Plagiarism that pleases
In 2013, a group of people appeared in Russia who checked whether Russian officials and politicians honestly received their academic degrees. This project is called Dissernet, and the results at that time were impressive. Six federal ministers, over 50 deputies of the State Duma and the Federation Council, and 15 governors were found to have plagiarized—at least half of the texts of their dissertations were direct quotations from other publications without citing any sources. The experts were able to identify those who had attributed the results of someone else’s work and those who helped design them and organize the formalized process of approval of theses and dissertations. According to their estimates, it could be that in Russia annually up to 20,000 fake dissertations are drawn, and the cost of such a “service” is up to $25,000.
On Thursday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, speaking at a news conference after talks with UK Foreign Secretary Liz Truss, said:
“...President Putin, at a press conference following talks with President Macron... proposed to jointly seek generally acceptable approaches to ensuring the security of both Ukraine and European countries and, of course, the Russian Federation.”
When I heard those words, I cringed—Vladimir Putin had never said he was concerned about Ukraine’s security and that he was ready to negotiate about how it could be guaranteed. I went to the Kremlin website and began to reread the transcript of the press conference of the Russian and French presidents. Et voilà! I found the following there:
“...together we must build concrete security guarantees for the member states of the European Union, for the states of the region: Ukraine, Georgia, Belarus, and Russia. This is exactly the goal we should have.”
But… these were Emmanuel Macron’s words.
I do not think the French President should loudly declare plagiarism and demand satisfaction and reference to the source. If I were him, I would not bring it up, but instead, I would pick up the story, praise the Russian initiative and suggest that it become the central topic of future negotiations. I think what happened today reflects a serious shift in the Kremlin’s position, which President Macron can take credit for.
The fact is that the phrase uttered by Sergei Lavrov was in his introductory statement—i.e., it was part of a previously prepared text, rather than an improvisation during his answer to a journalist’s question, which could always be put down to the fact that the minister did not understand the question properly. Consequently, this phrase was deliberately included in the text of the Minister’s speech and could hardly have been done without the agreement of Vladimir Putin—the Russian Foreign Ministry has long ceased to be the agency that formulates Russia’s foreign policy.
To thank him
The primary purpose of Kazakh president Kassym-Zhomart Tokayev’s visit to Moscow is clear: To thank Vladimir Putin for his support for the Kazakh leader a month ago. In early January, public protests over rising car gas prices, which emerged in the west of the country, instantly turned into riots in the central city of Almaty (which is over 2,000 miles away by road), during which many government institutions were vandalized.
Both leaders felt the need to assess these events publicly, and it turned out that they have differences on this issue.
For Vladimir Putin, the events in Kazakhstan fit perfectly into the world’s scheme that he had created in his head many years ago: Internal enemies and external enemies acting together. In his words, the January events in Kazakhstan represented
“an unprecedented challenge to the country’s sovereignty, integrity, and stability. In fact, Kazakhstan faced an act of terrorist aggression carried out with the direct involvement of destructive forces from within and without.”
President Tokayev did not object to the external factor; otherwise, he would have had difficulty explaining his reasons for seeking help from the CSTO, which member states have agreed to provide military support to each other in the event of external aggression. At the same time, the Kazakh leader openly called a coup attempt, refusing to admit the involvement of anyone from the political entourage of former President Nursultan Nazarbayev.
“...it was a carefully prepared operation by international terrorists, bandits, who attacked Kazakhstan with the aim, first of all, of undermining the constitutional order and, of course, of committing a coup d'état.”
So far, Kazakh law enforcement agencies have not named any foreigners who might have acted as riot organizers. Still, it is well known that former Prime Minister and head of the KNB (political police) Karim Massimov has been charged with high treason.
Of the minor details of this visit, it is worth noting that President Tokayev was able to shake hands repeatedly with President Putin, and they were at a slight distance from each other during the talks. In contrast to French President Emmanuel Macron or Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, who had to sit at 20 feet from the Russian leader. The reason for this confidence was that President Tokayev has been vaccinated with the Russian “Sputnik V,” which Vladimir Putin considers the only effective COVID vaccine in the world.
Big success
On the night of February 7-8, the Russian Interior Ministry blocked three websites (Ferum, Trumps Dump, and Uas-Service) that sold stolen credit card data. The blocking announcement appeared on the site Uas-Service. Their owners were also selling compromised SSN numbers and access to RDP-servers (Remote Desktop Protocol) to ensure the anonymity of cybercriminals.
The total number of bank cards that were blocked exceeded 113 million. Although the share of Russian cards was low, the sites were Russian-language and operated by Russian-language administrators. Moreover, all three were on the same server, suggesting that the same hacker group may have operated them.
War on teenagers
A military court announced the verdict on three 16-year-old teenagers from the Siberian city of Kansk (halfway between Moscow and Vladivostok) who were accused of terrorism. One of them, Nikita Uvarov, whom the investigation considered the group leader, received five years in prison and a fine of 30,000 rubles ($400). The other two defendants in the case were exempted from criminal liability, as they cooperated with the investigation and gave incriminating evidence against Uvarov.
In the summer of 2020, the teenagers were detained when they were 14 years old. This happened after leaflets criticizing the authorities and words of support for political prisoners appeared in Kansk—including on the FSB building. The investigation accused the teenagers of manufacturing explosives and preparing terrorist attacks but could not present any convincing evidence in court. The court verdict was based on the work of linguistic experts who analyzed the correspondence of the teenagers in social networks and recognized them as terrorists:
—Reference to historian Pyotr Kropotkin and his statement “Rights are not given, they are taken.”
—Discussion of the events in France (yellow vests) and Belarus.
—Mention of Kurt Cobain and his calls for “fierce revolutionary struggle.”
—Uvarov’s postings, which instill uncertainty about the future and the value of the uprising; hostile attitudes toward Russian President V. V. Putin, the population of the Russian Federation, and groups of “several wealthy families” are opposed.
—Placement of propaganda material attributed to [famous Russian poet and musician] Yegor Letov, which contains provocative messages: “do not lay down your arms,” “the Motherland is waiting for you,” “take action.”
There is no solution to one problem without the second
The famous phrase—There are two historical problems in Russia: fools and roads—is attributed to writers Nikolai Gogol and Mikhail Saltykov-Shchedrin, historian Nikolay Karamzin, and even Emperor Nicholas I. Judging by the focus of the propaganda machine, the Kremlin is, unfortunately, trying to exacerbate the former. Therefore, even the minimal efforts of the authorities aimed at solving the second problem should be welcomed.
The length of the first category, roads in Russia (at least two lanes in each direction, with the dividing stripe and no intersections on the same level), is about 5 thousand kilometers. The Russian government approved the transport strategy promising that by 2035 there will be 17.5 thousand kilometers of high-speed roads in the country. However, almost all the new roads will be built after 2024; until then, only the 800-kilometer highway “Moscow-Kazan” will be constructed.
The idea to connect Moscow with the vital transport artery of the European part, the Volga River, by the shortest route has long been hovering in the corridors of power. At first, preference was given to the railroad. The government promised to complete the construction of a high-speed railway for the 2018 FIFA World Cup, intending to extend it to Yekaterinburg and then to Tyumen, Omsk, and Novosibirsk. And, in the distant future, to China. There were long discussions about this project; it was costly, and the federal budget was not ready to finance it in full. Private money could not be raised either, as the project’s economics were not at all obvious. The attempt to invite Chinese banks and companies to finance the project also proved unsuccessful: The Chinese investors demanded strict guarantees from the Russian government regarding the project’s payback period and the transfer to them of the functions of the general contractor. The latter was utterly unacceptable to the Russian government. In Russia, all large investment projects financed from the budget can go only to people close to President Putin or, at the very least, to the Minister of Transport.
In 2016, it became clear that the railroad would not be built; the government changed the concept and commissioned a road construction project. This was undoubtedly an intelligent decision. First, the project turned out to be significantly cheaper. Second, it allowed for new roads adjacent to the highway. Third, traditionally, the highway attracts new business (hotels, cafés and restaurants, gas stations, logistics facilities, and small industrial plants) along its entire length.
In the fall of 2018, the government approved the construction concept. Another six months later, a detailed path of the new highway was adopted. Another six months after that, the Ministry of Finance said it was ready to include funding for the new road in the budget starting in 2021. After that, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Maxim Akimov promised that construction would be completed by 2027. However, such a long construction period did not suit Vladimir Putin, who, in the summer of 2020, ordered the completion of the construction by 2024.
Such a decision has left no time to bounce: The construction began early last year. To finance this project takes about 40% of all funds allocated from the federal budget to develop the road network in the country. At the same time, the Accounting Chamber of Russia found out that the financing started long before the project documentation was approved, or the technological and price audit was performed—the cost of the construction work was determined by eye.
In addition, the analysis of the design documentation collected by the beginning of 2022 revealed that there were no junctions and U-turns on the route. Of course, they are designed, but only at the meeting points of individual sections, which will be carried out by different contractors. As a result, the distance between the exits to the regional roads or U-turns will be 80 to 110 kilometers.
Are the two historical problems of Russia so closely intertwined that it is impossible to solve them separately? And an attempt to solve one of them is necessarily compensated by the escalation of the other?