Gzt.ru, Gazeta.ru, Nezavisimaya Gazeta

Russian protestors rally in Moscow and Washington

On August 31, the opposition and supporters of the activist movement Strategy-31 failed to stage a protest on Moscow's Triumfalnaya Square in support of article 31 of the Russian Constitution. Article 31 guarantees the right of Russian citizens to assemble peacefully without weapons, to organize meetings, rallies, demonstrations, processions and pickets.

The Moscow city government did not approve the location for the protest and the opposition refused to move. Consequently, attempts to hold the rally were met by police intervention. Between 400 and 800 activists are estimated to have attended the protest, at which about 70 people were arrested.

The police used loudspeakers to announce that the protest had not been sanctioned, notifying protesters that they were violating the law. Strategy-31's supporters gathered on sidewalks near the entrance to the Tchaikovsky Concert Hall at the intersection of Tverskaya Street and Triumfalnaya Square.

They held copies of the Russian Constitution, placards and badges with the number 31, chanting "Russia without Putin."

Leaders of the radical opposition not represented in parliament, namely, Boris Nemtsov, Ilya Yashin, Mikhail Shneider and Eduard Limonov, arrived at the square escorted by members of the European Parliament repeating that they were shocked by what was happening.

Nemtsov was taken to a police bus as an activist. Members of the European Parliament were not detained.

It was obvious from the morning that the police had orders to break up the protest, and that the meeting's organizers wanted to stage yet another provocation. Vyacheslav Kozlov, Deputy Chief of the Moscow Police Department, stressed that those organizing the illegal meeting would lead protesters to the square, with the express aim of getting them detained by the police.

Several days ago, Russan Prime Minister Vladimir Putin told journalists during his trip to Khabarovsk and Chita that the radical opposition was actively seeking to provoke the authorities into dispersing protesters, and that this was their goal.

"If their goal is to persuade the government to make concessions, and if such concessions are made, then another pretext for provocation will be found. And this will continue indefinitely," Putin said.

On Saturday, Washington saw the largest protest against the policies of President Barack Obama's administration to date. The Restoring Honor Rally was conceived as a non-political event in honor of the U.S. Armed Forces, in support of patriotism and American heritage as a whole.

Organizers said about 500,000 people gathered in downtown Washington, while NBC News estimated the number of participants at 300,000.

The three-hour rally featured speeches in defense of American freedoms interspersed with patriotic songs and prayers to the Almighty.

The event was organized by Glenn Lee Beck, an American conservative radio and television host, political commentator, author, and entrepreneur who makes no secret of his dislike for Obama and the Democratic Party.

Beck said in the run-up to the rally that it should prioritize religious issues, rather than political slogans. Protesters were asked not to bring political placards, and not a single official was given the opportunity to address the assembled crowd.

The rally participants were well-behaved, and the speakers did not mention Obama's name even once.

RBC Daily

College graduates outnumber workers in Russia

If a college or a university produces graduates not wanted in business, it will be reorganized or closed. That was the proposal the president agreed to at the anniversary meeting of the State Council on Education Tuesday. With the academic year about to begin, the participants focused on a shortage of worker specialties and discussed the possibility of allowing businesses to shoot films like old Soviet films that promoted the trades of steeplejacks or miners.

Tuesday's meeting of the Council was an anniversary meeting (the idea was first conceived ten years ago), so both former and incumbent governors were invited to attend the Kremlin event. Also, as Dmitry Medvedev announced, it was the Council's first meeting jointly with the commission on modernization. So big business representatives also attended the meeting.

The topic chosen for this festive occasion proved to be far from festive. As the president admitted, Russia's system of education has failed to provide strong competition. According to Education Minister Andrei Fursenko, only one-third of colleges and universities meet the requirements of the real economic sector.

Businessmen complained about a bias in education as well. Mikhail Prokhorov, President of the ONEXIM Group and member of the modernization commission, said that the answer to the question of who is to make an invention is known, but not the answer about who will actually make it work. "Russia now trains 70% of its specialists with a higher education, 20% with a secondary education, and 10% with a primary education. The actual requirements are the opposite: 80% with a primary and secondary education and 20% with a higher education. That is to say, no jobs are guaranteed for 50% of all college graduates," he said, voicing concern. Prokhorov then lashed out at the media: Russian television, he said, pointedly laughs at the working man to scorn and run down his prestige.

Governors also took up the theme of prestige. Vologda Region Governor Vyacheslav Pozgalev recalled that in Soviet times the movie Vysota (High Up) made the steeplejack trade popular.

On Prokhorov's suggestion, the Ministry of Education and Science was instructed to make a study of the discrepancy between the system of vocational training and labor legislation. Now a young person enrolls at college at the age of 15 or 16 and spends two years studying, although in the West the process takes between six and eight months. What is more, before he reaches the age of 18, he is not allowed to do practical training at a plant in his line. "At 18, he is drafted into the army and at 20 he has to be retrained," Prokhorov said. "If such restrictions exist, they must be eased," Medvedev backed the speaker and proposed that the issue be discussed with the proper ministries.

Vzglyad

Economic minister opposes capping food prices

Economic Development Minister Elvira Nabiullina considers it counterproductive to impose government limits on food prices. The minister believes it would be better to use market regulation mechanisms instead, for example, large-scale interindustry contracts.

The federal law On Trade, which came into force in 2010, stipulates that the government has the right to set price limits for a total of 24 staple foods, including bread, buckwheat and milk.

This means that if prices grow by more than 30% within 30 days, the government can set a price limit for this product for a period not exceeding 90 days. In that period, price growth is monitored by the Federal Antimonopoly Service and the General Prosecutor's Office.

However, Nabiullina believes that there is currently no reason to declare a war on prices just as there are no food shortages, since the existing supply meets the demand.

Formal analysis shows, however, that there is a reason to introduce government control over food prices. According to commodity price monitoring reports published by the Economic Development Ministry, as of August 23 the monthly growth of buckwheat prices has exceeded 30% in 42 Russian regions. Volgograd saw the biggest growth of 84.1%.

The drought has made things tougher for the Federal Antimonopoly Service, too. The service has recently initiated antimonopoly proceedings after it discovered a case of price collusion while inspecting prices on staple foods.

The antimonopoly service is currently monitoring the buckwheat prices, which. surged by 30% to 60% in August, while in some regions buckwheat even went off the shelves because people, fearing shortages, rushed to buy it. All in all, the antimonopoly service had opened 46 cases of setting excessively high food prices by August 26.

At the same time, the antimonopoly watchdog agrees with the Economic Development Ministry that price growth should be controlled by market mechanisms rather than government regulations. For example, the antimonopoly service and the Ministry of Industry and Trade believe that the main tool to stabilize the agricultural markets should be interindustry contracts. The Ministry of Industry and Trade is currently working on facilitating such contracts between the Retailers Association and unions of raw materials and agricultural producers. Estimates show that these contracts will effectively stabilize the price situation in the Russian food market.

Vedomosti

Politically, Russia is a country in transit

Vladimir Putin is evidence that political scientists are right. Russia is suffering from all the excesses of transition economies, and the interviews and statements made by the prime minister during his recent drive along the new Far East highway are additional proof that political scientists are right.

Irina Busygina and Mikhail Philippov write about the political and economic excesses of democratic transformation in transition societies in their article entitled "Democracy Is Not Free of Charge" (Vedomosti, February 10, 2010). The initial stage of economic reforms in post-Communist countries prompts an inevitable economic decline, with improvements to be expected only later.

American sociologist Adam Przeworski described the process as a J-curve, which highlights the tensions between economic reform and political stability. He argued that since economic reforms produce positive results only in the medium to long term - after a period of greater economic pain in the interim - governments who enact such reforms can expect strong social opposition (including defeat at the polls) as a reward for their efforts.

Joel Hellman from the World Bank drew a similar chart for political transformation, writing that political reforms fail or are halted less because of resistance by those who suffer as a consequence, and more because of the unwillingness of the winners to carry on.

American political scientist Ian Bremmer said instability is one drawback to reform. Stable closed societies must pass through a turbulent period before becoming stable open societies. North Korea and Belarus are stable because of their closed undemocratic political regimes, while West European countries and the Untied States are stable thanks to their reliance on open democratic political systems. Their systems are less suited to suppressing conflicts but are better adjusted to resolving and preventing them. The role of institutions is more important than the role of the individual, because these institutions, the public and the politicians all agree to honor codified rules, and this ensures a high degree of stability.

After ten years in power, Vladimir Putin has said in an interview with Kommersant correspondent Andrei Kolesnikov that he is not embarrassed by the excesses of economic and political development.

"If I think a problem is a priority, I stop thinking about possible political or administrative excesses we could encounter when trying to resolve it," he said driving along the Amur Highway.

However, there is one excess he cannot disregard - instability. Putin is prepared to abandon reforms if it becomes apparent that they could undermine stability, thus making Russia a closed stable system.

"On the whole, the country is developing sustainably, normally; I don't see any major problems. Well, the crisis did slow us down a bit, but it also helped us focus on our priorities. The most important thing for 2012 is that these problems do not deflect us from the path of stable development," Putin said.

He thinks that being closed can be a crucial instrument. He said in an interview with Russia-24 TV channel that import duties on cars would be raised. "Russia is not a WTO member yet, so we can afford it," he said.

Putin does not see mistakes in his work and lays the political system's drawbacks firmly at the door of the ongoing transition process: "We in fact have a transition economy that is serviced by a transition political system."

Vremya Novostei

Encouraging trends in Russian-Polish relations

Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov will arrive in Poland for a two-day working visit today.

Invited by his Polish counterpart Radoslaw Sikorski, Lavrov will also attend a meeting of Polish ambassadors, which is the first time a Russian foreign minister will attend the event in the history of Russian-Polish relations.

The two diplomats will speak on, A New Era in Polish-Russian Relations, Polish Foreign Ministry spokesman Rafal Sobczak said. Lavrov and Sikorski will also hold a one-on-one meeting and larger talks involving other officials from the two countries. They will discuss bilateral relations as well as Russia's relations with the European Union, partly because Poland will hold the rotating EU presidency in the second half of 2011.

Polish-Russian relations have been improving intensively in various areas. One of them is the bordering Kaliningrad Region's cooperation with northern regions of Poland, primarily with Warminsko-Mazurskie Province. Moscow welcomes a recent initiative by Sikorski and Interior Minister Jerzy Miller, who are trying to convince their EU counterparts to expand the local border traffic regime to the entire Kaliningrad Region. As of now, this regime only applies to areas within 50 km of the external land borders of the member states.

Last week, General Nikolai Makarov, Chief of the General Staff, visited Poland for the first time since the country's accession to NATO in 1999.

A joint meeting was also organized and held in Warsaw by Andrzej Halicki and Konstantin Kosachev, heads of the Polish and Russian parliaments' foreign affairs committees.

In addition, Justice Ministers Alexander Konovalov and Krzysztof Kwiatkowski have also exchanged visits, something unheard of in 15 years.

Trade and economic cooperation is also expanding. Two forums of the regions have been held, one in Russia and the other in Poland, organized by upper house speakers, Sergei Mironov and Bogdan Borusewicz. The latter will head a group of Polish officials who will travel to the Urals and Siberia later this week; he will visit Russian industrial centers and attend the 6th International Baikal Economic Forum in Irkutsk.

The West Siberian city of Tyumen will host a conference, Europe-Russia, on October 11-13, which is being prepared by Warsaw's Center for East European Studies, the Russian Foreign Ministry's Institute of International Relations (MGIMO) and the Tyumen Region government.

A group on complex issues co-chaired by MGIMO Rector Anatoly Torkunov and former Polish Foreign Minister Dr. Adam Daniel Rotfeld has been restored and will play an important role in resolving historical issues.

The Russian and Polish prime ministers have agreed to set up centers of dialogue and reconciliation in Russia and in Poland; speeding up this process is next on the agenda.

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MOSCOW, September 1 (RIA Novosti)