Armenian Defence Ministry sets up research institute

Armenian Defence Ministry sets up research institute

Mediamax news agency
31 May 04

Yerevan, 31 May: The opening ceremony of the Armenian Defence
Ministry’s National Strategic Research Institute named after Commander
Drastamat Kanayan took place in Yerevan today.

Armenian Defence Minister Serzh Sarkisyan said today that Drastamat
Kanayan’s heirs came out with the idea of setting up the institute in
1998. According to the defence minister, taking into account Armenia’s
difficult geopolitical surrounding, the foundation of the institute
“was an urgent necessity”.

The Armenian defence minister’s adviser, Col Haik Kotandzhyan, will
head the institute.

The All-Armenian Ayastan Fund ordered the construction of the institute
which will be finished in March 2005.

His is really a pressing business

Newsday (New York)
May 30, 2004 Sunday
CITY EDITION

QUEENS DIARY;
His is really a pressing business;
LIC’s Madame Paulette turns dry-cleaning into a celebrity-attracting
art form

BY MERLE ENGLISH. STAFF WRITER

Marcie Goodman Gottlieb lives on Manhattan’s Upper West Side but
doesn’t mind traveling to the East Side just to drop off her dry
cleaning. She’s been doing so for more than 10 years.

Her mother, who lives in Baltimore, uses the same dry cleaner,
sending in special items or bringing them with her on visits to New
York.

“They are the best at what they do,” Gottlieb said. “Their customer
service is incredible. They are so accommodating with everything you
take in. If you need it back immediately, they’ll get it back
immediately, and they’ll always get your stains out.”

The reason for the extra effort is Madame Paulette, a one-of-a-kind
dry cleaning business in Long Island City.

Basic black

The building out of which the business operates would be nondescript
except for its all-black exterior.

Classic black, a color often associated with haute couture, is a
signature for Madame Paulette’s president, John Mahdessian, 38.

Fresh out of Villanova University in 1987, Mahdessian took over from
his father what is now a 50-year-old family-owned business with a
reputation – Mahdessian states unequivocally – as “simply the finest
custom couture cleaner in the world.”

In keeping with that characterization, the building’s black exterior,
the company’s promotional materials and several products reflect the
image of the business as a service catering mostly to the world’s
high-end fashion houses and bridal salons.

A press kit is in velvety black stock, embossed with the name “Madame
Paulette” in golden script. A stain removal kit for upscale travelers
is encased in shiny black packaging.

Black is also the color of a custom-designed garment bag, a solid oak
hanger and a VIP gift box. And all carry Madame Paulette’s gold and
black logo showing a stylishly dressed woman and the company’s
initials.

But the elegant apparel that comes into Madame Paulette’s Long Island
City plant and headquarters from bridal salons at Barneys, Bergdorf
Goodman, Saks Fifth Avenue and such couture houses as Christian Dior,
Fendi, Givenchy, Gucci, Hermès, Prada, Versace and Yves St. Laurent,
is of all colors, textures and intricacies of design.

Mahdessian said his staff of artisans, tailors and craftspeople,
recruited from around the globe, are entrusted with “the finest
garments in the world.” Many are worn by runway models and
celebrities such as Jennifer Lopez, David Letterman, Madonna, Janet
Jackson, Steven Spielberg, Sting and Barbara Walters, whom he lists
among his clientele.

A visitor on a recent tour of the plant at 42-20 12th St. found the
place a beehive of activity as employees meticulously inspected,
dry-cleaned and hand-pressed clothing.

Already cleaned on hangers around them were Chanel suits, shirts,
dresses and gowns swathed in white garment bags with such labels as
Vera Wang and Angel Sanchez.

A pink, strapless seersucker gown belonging to Christie Brinkley was
ready for delivery to her home in the Hamptons. It was on one of the
paper mannequins Mahdessian uses to keep cleaned clothing
wrinkle-free. Also ready to go was Vogue fashion editor Andre Leon
Talley’s blue and yellow robe.

Madame Paulette developed techniques to keep fine clothes – many
adorned with appliques, embroidery, sequins, feathers and other
handwork – in their original splendor. Perspiration, blood and other
stains are removed according to the type of stain, its color and
chemistry.

“Even if you spill a whole bottle of red wine, it’s no problem,” said
Mahdessian, who refers to himself as “Johnny on the spot.”

Faded fabric colors are restored, and even vintage items considered
damaged beyond repair are salvaged, he said.

Madame’s touch

Unusual combinations of materials in garments are taken apart for the
special cleaning each material requires and are put back together by
couture tailors.

“The steps we take are painstaking and unconventional,” the company
states on its Website.

“We are pioneers in what we do,” Mahdessian said. “Fifty percent of
what we do here is by hand. We even use Q-tips because of the
intricacy of the work.”

Hand-finishing by Jahfrey Juvon, 22, of Maspeth, hired two months ago
in quality control, left an inexpensive woolen vest looking like
cashmere.

“Every single person that touches the garment is a quality-control
expert,” Mahdessian said. “Even business and casual attire deserve
the same expert attention to detail. Improper maintenance of the
garment wears the garment out. We can increase the garment’s life
expectancy and preserve its value.”

Treasured bridal gowns are cleaned and stored in museum-quality,
acid-free archival chamber boxes. Such attention costs more than
regular cleaning – $18 for a shirt or pair of pants, for example.

The business operates 24 hours a day to respond to emergencies, such
as a gown that is stained or stepped on during a wedding or similar
damage done to a vintage piece a celebrity is wearing at the Oscars.
Tailors, spotters and pressers are on hand “for any needs that come
up,” Mahdessian said. “We save the day all the time.”

Madame Paulette was founded by an uncle of Mahdessian’s father,
Noubar. The uncle, whose name Mahdessian couldn’t recall, was an
Armenian who came to the United States in 1957. The company was named
for the uncle’s wife.

All in the family

Noubar Mahdessian and his wife, Ann, a teacher and interior
decorator, ran the business until they retired and turned it over to
their son.

John Mahdessian, who grew up in Little Neck, lives in Long Island
City. Being a businessman wasn’t his first career choice. He had
graduated with a degree in marketing and planned to go into
investment banking.

He soon realized, however, that he loved the business. He expanded
the staff from 10 to 75 at the Long Island City headquarters and his
flagship 1255 Second Ave. site in Manhattan.

He was committed, he said, to making the business “the finest, most
advanced, state-of-the-art dry cleaning establishment in New York,
the U.S., and the world.”

Now the woman behind the name “is my mom,” Mahdessian said. “We
consider her Madame Paulette,” until he marries, he said.

Custom couture cleaning is only one reason that Gottlieb is willing
to travel across town.

“They’re friendly and smiley, and they’re all happy,” Gottlieb said.
“People say they’re expensive, but if they are, they’re worthy every
penny.”

GRAPHIC: Photo by Daniel Avila – John Mahdessian, president of Madame
Paulette, poses inside a robe owned by Vogue fashion editor Andre
Leon Talley in the cleaner’s headquarters in Long Island City.

BAKU: Azeris stage rally in Moscow to mark Republic Day

Azeris stage rally in Moscow to mark Republic Day

Turan news agency
28 May 04

Baku, 28 May: Over 500 Azerbaijanis staged a rally on Pushkin Square
in Moscow yesterday. This action was organized by the Movement for
Azerbaijan to mark 28 May – the Day of the Republic.

The demonstrators protested against the Armenian occupation of the
Azerbaijani territories. They called on the international community
to speed up its efforts for a peaceful settlement to the Karabakh
conflict.

The rally adopted an appeal to the UN and Russian President Vladimir
Putin, Turan learnt from the press service of the Movement for
Azerbaijan.

Kazakh Conference Calls For Enhanced Flight Security Measures

KAZAKH CONFERENCE CALLS FOR ENHANCED FLIGHT SECURITY MEASURES

Interfax-Kazakhstan news agency
27 May 04

Almaty, 27 May: Participants in the third international scientific
conference “Prospects for developing civil aviation and training
highly-qualified specialists” passed a resolution on Friday (as
received; presumably on Thursday, 27 May), which gives recommendations
to state bodies for flight security to be increased.

The text of the resolution, which was acquired by the
Interfax-Kazakhstan agency, says that the participants in the
conference are going to call on the governments of CIS member states
to take necessary actions to create a legal basis for cooperation in
the field of fighting against international terrorism in air transport.

That is why the CIS governments should ensure that the agreement on
cooperation to protect civil aviation from any illegal interference
(signed on 25 May 1995 in Minsk) be implemented. National budgets
should provide for funds to be allocated to finance events related
to implementing actions to ensure the security of civil aviation,
the resolution says.

Moreover, the authors of the resolution consider it necessary that
during their activities law-enforcement bodies of CIS member states
should take into account “that it is necessary to provide national
flight security services with assistance in dealing with problems of
protecting CIS civil aviation from acts of illegal interference”.

According to the resolution, CIS airmen will address international
and intergovernmental organizations within the CIS which are involved
in cooperation in the field of air transport.

The resolution says that these organizations jointly with
law-enforcement bodies, security services and other government bodies
should regularly deal with issues of comprehensively protecting civil
aviation from terrorist and other extremist attacks.

(Passage omitted: repeat)

The conference was held in Almaty on 24-27 May.

It was attended by experts from the International Civil Aviation
Organization (ICAO), the CIS interstate aviation committee, and the
chiefs of the aviation security services of Russia, Ukraine, Belarus,
Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Armenia, Azerbaijan
and Kazakhstan.

Armenian Experts’ View On Armenia’s Future

ARMENIAN EXPERTS’ VIEW ON ARMENIA’S FUTURE

A1 Plus | 15:48:39 | 27-05-2004 | Politics |

Only in 10 years Armenian will be reckoned among middle-level
countries, more than a half of 50 experts having participated in My
View on Future survey conducted by Armeian Center for National and
International Studies think.

46% of respondents think Armenia will be weak country, and only 4%
are convinced Armenia will turn into mighty state.

The Center has conducted also another expert-opinion survey on Armenian
foreign policy and its relations with superpowers.

The results of the survey were presented at the seminar-discussion
held in the Center on Thursday.

To the question whether cut in the U.S. humanitarian aid and financial
assistance will have impact on your family 72% respondents said “no”,
6% didn’t know what to say and 22% said “yes”.

Yerkir newspaper’s Editor-in-Chief Spartak Seiranyan reacting to the
question said he found the question irrelevant to the purpose and
wondered how such a question could help to have an idea of Armenian
foreign policy.

50% of respondents attach importance to the idea of improving
Armenian-Turkish relations and opening the border. 40% voiced their
disapproval over the idea and 10% didn’t respond.

It is remarkable that 30% of questioned experts are from state-owned
institutions and 70% from private enterprises.

BAKU: DM Ivanov denies Russian, US plan to use radar station

Defense Minister Ivanov denies Russian, US plan to use radar station

AzerNews, Azerbaijan
May 27 2004

On Friday at a news conference in Yerevan, Russian Defense Minister
Sergey Ivanov refuted the reports that Russia and the United States are
planning to use the Gabala radar station. An agreement on the status,
principles and terms of use of the Gabala station was concluded by
Russia and Azerbaijan

in Moscow on January 25, 2002. In compliance with the agreement,
the station is owned by Azerbaijan, and Russia leases the property
for 10 years. The agreement also stipulates that the station will
be used by Russia only for information and analytical purposes. The
use of the Gabala station “will not be used directly or indirectly
against the sovereignty and security of the Azerbaijan Republic”,
the document reads.

Commenting on the recent Azerbaijani media reports on Russian military
personnel of Armenian descent serving at the Gabala station, Ivanov
said Russia is a multi-national country and that the Russian army
includes officers of various nationalities, including Azerbaijanis.

Parliament to reconsider Russian use of Gabala radar station Opposition
MP Mais Safarli recently brought up the issue of Armenian officers
being involved at the Gabala radar station and stressed the importance
of taking measures in this respect. Safarli said the issue will be
reconsidered at the next Milli Majlis (parliament) session and the
parliament administration demanded that a decisive stand be taken on
the matter. “I raised the issue in a recent Milli Majlis session. As
far as I know, there are currently over 30 Armenian military personnel
at the station, which jeopardizes Azerbaijan’s national interests”,
he said. Safarli stated that Baku should demand the withdrawal
of Armenian military personnel from the Gabala station. He said
that Azerbaijan reserves the right to reconsider the terms of the
inter-governmental agreement envisioning the use of the facility by
Russia. Political scholar Zardusht Alizada stated that according to
the existing agreement between Russia and Azerbaijan, both Russian
soldiers and civilians work at the station. “Under the inter-state
protocol, Azerbaijan must guarantee their safety. The agreement
does not exclude service by Armenian military personnel at the
station, as this would contradict international legal norms”, Alizada
said. From this standpoint, Azerbaijan should not oppose the service
of Armenian officers at the Gabala station, he concluded. The Gabala
radar station was built in 1984 to monitor launch of inter-continental
ballistic missiles and flights on almost all types of aviation in the
Southern hemisphere. The station was actively used for radio-technical
intelligence during the Iran-Iraq war in 1980s, the Persian Gulf
War, and during anti-terrorism operations in Afghanistan. The Gabala
station is an important part of Russia’s missile defense system.

BAKU: NK issue on Agenda

Azer Tag, Azerbaijan State Info Agency
May 26 2004

NAGORNO-KARABAKH ISSUE ON AGENDA
[May 26, 2004, 21:54:55]

A regular meeting of the PACE Political Affairs Committee was
held in Paris on May 25. Azerbaijan was represented by Chairman
of the Standing Committee of the Milli Majlis on International and
Inter-parliamentary Relations Samad Seyidov, deputy Vagif Vakilov and
Head of the Permanent Representation of Azerbaijan to the Council of
Europe, Ambassador Agshin Mehdiyev.

During the meeting, PACE rapporteur on Armenia-Azerbaijan,
Nagorno-Karabakh conflict Terry Davis announced that the text of his
related report is not yet prepared, and that that would be submitted
for discussion after amendments based on Azerbaijan and Armenian
remarks have been studied and introduced in the report.

Meanwhile, Mr. Davis admitted that his last meeting in Warsaw with
Presidents Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan and Robert Kocharyan of Armenia,
as well as a number meetings between the two countries’ Foreign
Ministers, and change in composition of the OSCE Minsk Group had
given him confidence in achieving certain progress in the settlement
of the conflict.

It should be specially noted that the issue remains in the agenda,
and the Azerbaijani side is insisting on and will do achieve prompt
consideration of the problem at the PACE session.

BAKU: BBC Radio station warned

BBC RADIO STATION WARNED
[May 25, 2004, 23:03:55]

Azer Tag, Azerbaijan State Info Agency
May 25 2004

In connection with the fact that correspondent of BBC radio station,
ignoring the laws of Azerbaijan, has gone to Nagorny Karabakh occupied
by the Armenians and has broadcast a program, chairman of the State
Broadcasting Company Nizami Khudiyev has sent to the management of
the said radio station a letter with warning.

According to the norms of international law, the broadcasting company
cannot suspend transmission of radio station directly, Nizami Khudiyev
told AzerTAj correspondent. Therefore, the management of BBC was
warned by means of the letter, also was brought to their notice
that actions of the employee of radio station contradict norms of
international law and the mentioned fact serves interests of one of
the conflicting sides – Armenia.

In the letter, also is underlined that if employees of the radio
station repeatedly will admit similar facts, then, broadcasting of
BBC in Azerbaijan would be suspended.

It has to be reminded that the BBC broadcasts in Azerbaijan within two
hours per day – 1 hour in the Azerbaijan language and for 30 minutes –
in Russian and English languages.

ANCA Capitol Hill Lobby Days Highlight Nationwide Grassroots Activi

Armenian National Committee of America
888 17th St., NW, Suite 904
Washington, DC 20006
Tel: (202) 775-1918
Fax: (202) 775-5648
E-mail: anca@anca.org
Internet:

PRESS RELEASE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 24, 2004
Contact: Elizabeth S. Chouldjian
Tel: (202) 775-1918

ANCA CAPITOL HILL LOBBY DAYS HIGHLIGHT NATIONWIDE GRASSROOTS
ACTIVISM ON GENOCIDE RECOGNITION; SUPPORT FOR ARMENIA, NAGORNO
KARABAGH

— Armenian Americans Participate in over 90 Meetings
and Visits, Culminating in ANCA Capitol Hill
Observance of the Armenian Genocide

WASHINGTON, DC – A record number of activists from across the U.S.
traveled to Washington, DC this April for a series of advocacy
meetings on Capitol Hill, coinciding with the Armenian National
Committee of America (ANCA) 10th annual Armenian Genocide
Observance.

Over 90 meetings were held with Members of Congress from
California, Delaware, Florida, Indiana, Illinois, Maryland,
Massachusetts, Michigan, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York,
Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Texas, and Virginia.

“We were gratified by the growing number of participants who
traveled to Washington, DC for this, our 10th annual Capitol Hill
Genocide Observance,” explained ANCA Executive Director Aram
Hamparian. “Each year, we have seen increased enthusiasm,
sophistication, and confidence among our activists in their
advocacy for the Armenian Cause.”

Among the numerous issues discussed with Representatives, Senators,
and their staff were the Congressional Genocide Resolutions
(H.Res.193 and S.Res.164), U.S. assistance to Armenia and Nagorno
Karabagh, US-Armenia economic relations–namely the Permanent
Normal Trade Relations (PNTR) legislation currently pending in the
US Senate, maintaining equal levels of military aid to Armenia and
Azerbaijan, and Armenia’s cooperation in the war on terrorism.
Members of Congress were also presented with folders that had
detailed information on the issues being discussed.

This year, joining the ANC activists in the Congressional meetings
were Colgate University Professor Peter Balakian and the Honorable
Madeleine Dalphond-Guiral, lead sponsor of the recently adopted
Armenian Genocide motion in the Canadian House of Commons.

During several meetings, Ms. Dalphond-Guiral took the time to brief
Congressional Members on the passage of the Canadian resolution and
encouraged them to take similar steps to reaffirm the United States
record on the Armenian Genocide. Professor Balakian–author of the
New York Times best seller “The Burning Tigris: The Armenian
Genocide and America’s Response”–detailed to Members the
exhaustive record of the US reaction to the Armenian Genocide and
pointed out the tremendous amount of US archives available on the
Armenian Genocide.

Both Balakian and Dalphond-Guiral were honored by the ANCA during
the Capitol Hill Observance of the Armenian Genocide.

Activists met with and visited the following Senate offices:
Lincoln Chafee (R-RI), John Cornyn (R-TX), Bob Graham (D-FL), Judd
Gregg (R-NH), Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX), Edward Kennedy (D-MA),
John Kerry (D-MA), Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ), Bill Nelson (D-FL),
Jack Reed (D-RI), Rick Santorum (R-PA), Arlen Specter (R-PA), John
Sununu (R-RI), and Jim Talent (R-MO).

ANC representatives also met with the following House offices:
Speaker of the House J. Dennis Hastert (R-IL) and Representatives
Joe Baca (D-CA), Charles Bass (R-NH), Bob Beauprez (R-CO), Xavier
Becerra (D-CA), Howard Berman (D-CA), Earl Blumenauer (D-OR), Jeb
Bradley (R-NH), Robert Brady (D-PA), Eric Cantor (R-VA), Dennis
Cardoza (D-CA), Michael Castle (D-DE), Philip Crane (R-IL), John
Culberson (R-TX), Susan Davis (D-CA), John Doolittle (R-CA), Mike
Doyle (D-PA), Philip English (R-PA), Anna Eshoo (D-CA), Sam Farr
(D-CA), Chaka Fattah (D-PA), Michael Ferguson (R-NJ), Rodney
Frelinghuysen (R-NJ), Bob Filner (D-CA), Scott Garrett (R-NJ), Sam
Graves (R-MO), Jim Gerlach (R-PA), Jim Greenwood (R-PA), Melissa
Hart (R-PA), Wally Herger (R-CA), Joseph Hoeffel (D-PA), Tim Holden
(D-PA), Rush Holt (D-NJ), Michael Honda (D-CA), Paul Kanjorski (D-
PA), Mark Kirk (R-IL), Patrick Kennedy (D-NH), James Langevin (D-
RI), Barbara Lee (D-CA), Sheila Jackson Lee (D-TX), William
Lipinski (D-IL), Zoe Lofgren (D-CA), Nita Lowey (D-NY), Edward
Markey (D-MA), Robert Matsui (D-CA), Scott McInnis (R-CO), Howard
McKeon (R-CA), Marty Meehan (D-MA), Juanita Millender-McDonald (D-
CA), George Miller (D-CA), Timothy Murphy (R-PA), John Murtha (D-
PA), Devin Nunes (R-CA), Doug Ose (R-CA), Frank Pallone, Jr. (D-
NJ), Bill Pascrell (D-NJ), Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), John Peterson (R-
PA), Joseph Pitts (R-PA), Todd Platts (R-PA), Richard Pombo (R-CA),
Jon Porter (R-NV), Ed Royce (R-CA), Adam Schiff (D-CA), E. Clay
Shaw, Jr. (R-FL), Brad Sherman (D-CA), Don Sherwood (R-PA), Bill
Shuster (R-PA), Hilda Solis (D-CA), Fortney Pete Stark (D-CA),
Thomas Tancredo (R-CO), Ellen Tauscher (D-CA), Mike Thompson (D-
CA), John Tierney (D-MA), Pat Toomey (R-PA), Diane Watson (D-CA),
Henry Waxman (D-CA), Curt Weldon (R-PA), and Lynn Woolsey (D-CA).

#####

www.anca.org

Here today, where tomorrow?

The Economist
May 22, 2004
U.S. Edition

Here today, where tomorrow?

Mr Putin keeps everyone guessing

ST PETERSBURG, May 2003. Historic buildings shone with freshly gilded
domes and new coats of paint. Mr Putin, having contrived to assemble
47 world leaders for a series of international summits to coincide
with the city’s 300th anniversary, was showing the world the former
imperial capital in its full glory.

It was the high summer of Mr Putin’s relations with the West. Over
three years, he had gradually sidelined Russia’s foreign-policy hawks
who pined for Soviet supremacy and mistrusted any rapprochement with
the former enemy. Thanks to his immediate declaration of solidarity
with George Bush after the September 11th attacks, America had turned
a blind eye to the uglier sides of his own regime, including his
characterisation of the war in Chechnya as part of the war on terror.

For months, the world’s most powerful men had been wooing Mr Putin to
use Russia’s permanent seat on the UN Security Council either to
support or to oppose an attack on Iraq. This presented him with a
dilemma: if he supported it, he would look like an American puppet,
but if he opposed it, America might bypass the UN, invalidating
Russia’s biggest remaining claim to being a global power. It never
came to a vote; the UN was sidelined anyway; but Mr Putin somehow
managed to stay on fairly good terms with everyone all the same.

However, since then a chill has set in. The Yukos affair, the Duma
election and the blatantly fraudulent presidential election in
Chechnya last October got foreign leaders to take fears about Russian
authoritarianism more seriously. The assassination earlier this month
of Chechnya’s president, Akhmad Kadyrov, made a mockery of Russia’s
claims that the situation there was “normalising”. The expansion of
NATO and the European Union right up to Russia’s borders revived old
disputes about visa rules, security and trade barriers. The roar of
NATO jets patrolling just outside Russian airspace is almost drowned
out by the grinding of teeth in the defence and foreign ministries.

Russia has been squeezed into a narrower space. Countries such as the
Baltics, which used to be under its thumb, are now members of the EU.
Countries such as Ukraine and Belarus, which Russia still considers
part of its backyard, are now Europe’s neighbours, and therefore its
concern. That has brought nasty surprises. When Russia last November
brokered a peace deal in Moldova that would have involved Russian
“peacekeeping” troops staying there until 2020, it expected no
resistance. But Moldova’s president, under pressure from European
leaders as well as from his own people (who had watched Edward
Shevardnadze being swept from power in Georgia only a couple of days
earlier), scrapped the deal at the last minute, infuriating the
Russian leadership.

Old assumptions have changed. The Partnership and Co-operation
Agreement that Russia first signed with the EU a decade ago had “an
integrationist goal”, says Fyodor Lukyanov, editor of Russia in
Global Affairs. “It meant that Russia should gradually adopt EU
standards. But under Putin, Russia doesn’t want to become just like
Europe. It won’t have human rights as a priority. It doesn’t want to
be endlessly coming to agreements on things.”

In February the European Commission admitted that its strategy of
gradually integrating Russia, the fruit of one of the St Petersburg
summits, was getting bogged down. “Russian convergence with universal
and European values will to a large extent determine the nature and
quality of our partnership,” it observed pointedly.

Yet as it looks around its new, smaller Lebensraum, Russia sees that
the place has something cosily familiar about it: it is a lot like
the old Soviet Union. It may now be called the Commonwealth of
Independent States (CIS), but their independence goes only so far.
The Kremlin sends advisers to help its preferred candidates with
election campaigns. It vies with the growing American presence there,
using Russia’s remaining military bases and, in Georgia, loyal
statelets as levers.

Last September Anatoly Chubais, the head of the state electricity
firm, UES, said Russia should become a “liberal empire”, extending
its reach on the economic side. Though he was then campaigning for
his opposition party, SPS, his words have resonance in the Kremlin,
says Mr Lukyanov. As big Russian firms outgrow opportunities at home
they are increasingly venturing abroad, especially to countries where
Russian is still spoken.

The government is doing much the same. A preliminary agreement on a
single economic space for the CIS pushes Russia further from Europe’s
economic embrace (though it will take ages and may never happen at
all). Russia is unlikely to replace the Middle East as the West’s
main source of oil, but when Russia eventually builds a Far East
pipeline, it will forge closer ties with Asia. UES has bought
electricity companies in Georgia and Armenia, and Gazprom owns stakes
in firms all across the CIS and in much of Europe (see map, previous
page).

Yet strengthening its hold in the CIS does not mean that Russia is
withdrawing from the West. Mr Putin may not care what foreigners
think of the way he runs his country, but he cares a great deal about
its status in the world, and thinks these two things can be kept
separate (after all, they are for China). Now that Russia’s
Security-Council veto has lost its shine, he will concentrate on his
country’s prospective chairmanship of the G8 in 2006. He is expected
to try hard to get preliminary approval for WTO membership by then.

For that, Russia will have to negotiate with many countries, above
all with the EU over the price of the gas it exports there. There are
plenty of other shared problems, from drug-trafficking to terrorism
to migration, so the West will continue to have plenty of dealings
with Russia, as well as considerable leverage.

One way of using this wisely will be to show Mr Putin that his
approach to many of his domestic problems makes them the world’s
problems too. He believes that Russia needs a strong leader to
contain threats such as economic and political refugees, a decaying
army, terrorist breeding-grounds and epidemics spiralling out of
control. But the strength that enables the country to cope with all
this is also a weakness: at the moment too much depends on the man at
the top. A sudden jolt (a sharp economic downturn, a new outburst of
terrorist attacks, or any mishap that might befall Mr Putin himself)
could tip the country over the edge again. A more democratic Russia
would be a more stable one, and less worrying for the world in
general.

It does not help that people have trouble understanding what Mr Putin
himself wants for Russia. As examples such as the Yukos affair or his
dealings with the media show, he has an uncanny ability to keep
everyone guessing. Mikhail Fradkov, his new prime minister, was about
the only candidate that not a single political pundit had thought of;
and also the only one bland enough to leave a large question mark
over why he was chosen.

But now that Mr Putin is as much in control as he ever will be, the
next few months should provide a clearer indication of where he is
heading. Telltale signs will be whether he lets his reformist
ministers get involved in issues that have so far been the province
of the siloviki, such as military spending; how he brings the Yukos
affair to a close; whether he encourages the oligarchs to invest in
ways that help develop the economy rather than merely plug holes in
state welfare spending; and how he responds to his officials’ more
retrograde ideas (he recently softened a law restricting public
gatherings after an outcry against it).

In broad terms, though, Mr Putin’s agenda for Russia is clear: he
wants it to be a global power and an economic tiger, but also a
controllable, monolithic state where suggestions are welcome but
opposition is not. “Russia was not a democracy in the 1990s and it’s
not an autocracy now,” says Nina Khrushcheva, a professor at the New
School in New York. “Russia is a process, but we always insist on
labelling it as a finished product, as this or that, and then scold
it immediately if it doesn’t fit.”

Yet the 20th century had many such countries in transition, and many
of them stayed that way for decades before the system cracked and
democracy started to seep in: think of Mexico, South Korea, Malaysia,
Chile, Singapore. Russia is not what it was 13 years ago; it is not
what, 13 years ago, everyone hoped it would be today; nor is it
better or worse; it is simply what it is. And given how fast things
change there, tomorrow it might well be something completely
different.