PUTIN SAYS HE WON'T INTERFERE IN BASHNEFT CASE
Of course he won't. Everybody already knows how this movie is supposed to end...
HUMAN SHIELD TACTICS IN DONETSK
RBK'S LIST OF SOLDIERS KILLED IN UKRAINE
Paul De Grauwe of the London School of Economics has a fascinating post up on his blog, "Ivory Tower" calling for the European Union to import an import tax on Russian energy -- and to use the revenues to either compensate consumers for higher prices or to develop alternative energy sources.
I came across this little gem thanks to a tweet by Estonian President Toomas Hendrik Ilves.
De Grauwe notes that Russian oil accounts for 34 percent of EU imports, while the figure for gas is 32 percent. The EU accounts for 84 percent of Russian oil exports and 80 percent of its gas exports.
"In fact the sales of Russian oil and gas to the EU provide for more than half of all Russian government revenue. Thus it can be said that Russia is more dependent on its exports to the EU than the EU is dependent on Russian oil and gas imports," he writes.
"That creates an opportunity to put pressure on Russia in order to increase the economic cost of aggression.
Here are the money grafs:
"Here's what I would do if I were European policymaker. I would impose a tax on oil and gas from Russia. Such a tax would have the following effects. First, EU importers would have to pay more for Russian oil and gas and would therefore look for alternative sources of supply. This would reduce the demand for Russian oil and gas. Since the EU is a very big player this effect would be big also. Second, and this follows immediately from the first effect, Russia would have to lower the price of its oil and gas so as to find other buyers in the world. This would create an important shortfall in Russian government revenues, reducing the capacity of Russia to wage wars.
One may object here that this tax would also hurt us because it would raise the price the EU consumers would have to pay for oil and gas. This is not the case, however. The import tax generates revenues for the EU-governments. These revenues could be used to compensate the EU-consumers. Alternatively, they could be used to promote policies aiming at making us less dependent on fossil fuel. Whatever we chose to do with the tax revenue, we would not be harmed by it.
This is an application of what economists call an “optimal tariff”. By the very fact that we are more important for Russia than the other way around, we can exploit our strong economic power and impose an import tax that maximizes our welfare and reduces Russia’s. We should do just that."
De Grauwe concludes that: "The European Union has the economic power to confront and to stop Russian aggression. It must use this power."
Read the whole brilliant thing here.
MORNING NEWS ROUNDUP
Good morning. Here are a few items from RFE/RL's News Desk:
U.S.: RUSSIA STILL GIVING SEPARATISTS WEAPONS
The United States has accused Russia of continuing to arm pro-Russian separatists after a September 5 cease-fire between the rebels and Kyiv.
"Russia continues to supply the separatists with weapons even since the cease-fire," State Department Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs Victoria Nuland said on Oct. 2 at the U.S.-Central Europe Strategy Forum in Washington.
Russia has consistently denied giving the rebels weapons.
The cease-fire is still in official effect despite the fact that deadly fighting has occurred in and around Donetsk in recent days.
Nuland added, "there is not a military solution to this if the Russian Federation chooses to go in and flatten Ukraine, because the Russian military is always going to be larger."
SWISS RED CROSS WORKER KILLED BY SHELLING IN DONETSK
The International Committee of the Red Cross has confirmed that one of its Swiss employees has been killed by shelling in the eastern Ukrainian city of Donetsk.
A local rescue worker, Andriy Livchenko, told AFP that the Red Cross worker was killed on October 2 when a shell hit the Red Cross office building in Donetsk.
Pro-Russian separatists control Donetsk and the Defense Ministry of the so-called Donetsk People's Republic said the Red Cross worker was a Swiss national.
It was not immediately clear who launched the attack.
Fighting has intensified since October 1 near Donetsk's airport as separatists have attempted to seize control of the facility from government forces.
Ukraine's military said on October 2 that separatists were continuing an offensive they began the previous day on "a broad front."
The airport has been a focus of fighting between government forces and the separatists despite a September 5 cease-fire.
A local rescue worker, Andriy Livchenko, told AFP that the Red Cross worker was killed on October 2 when a shell hit the Red Cross office building in Donetsk.
Pro-Russian separatists control Donetsk and the self-described Defense Ministry of the so-called Donetsk People's Republic said the Red Cross worker was a Swiss national.
It was not immediately clear who launched the attack.
Fighting has intensified since October 1 near Donetsk's airport as separatists have attempted to seize control of the facility from government forces.
Ukraine's military said on October 2 that separatists were continuing an offensive they began the previous day on "a broad front."
The airport has been a focus of fighting between government forces and the separatists despite a September 5 cease-fire.
Ukrainian military spokesman Vladyslav Seleznyov said government forces repelled four attacks on the airport in the evening of October 1, destroying a tank and killing seven rebels.
Seleznyov said the separatists used tanks, multiple-launch rocket systems, artillery, and mortars during the overnight attack and when they resumed their assault on the morning of October 2.
Aleksandr Zakharchenko, who calls himself the prime minister of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic, was quoted as saying on October 1 that separatist forces control “90 percent of the airport's territory” and plan to have it fully under their control “in two or three days at most."
Three people were reported killed on October 1 when a shell exploded on a school playground, while several others died when a shell hit a minivan on a nearby street.
The blasts occurred as pupils returned to school after the start of the school year was postponed from September 1 due to fighting.
Meanwhile, diplomatic pressure on Russia continued as German Chancellor Angela Merkel told Russian President Vladimir Putin via phone on October 1 that Moscow has a duty to exert influence on the separatists in Ukraine.
According to a German government spokesman, the two leaders expressed concerned that violence was still being used in Ukraine every day.
Merkel said the border between Ukraine and Russia needed to be monitored and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) had a big role to play in that.
(Based on reporting by Reuters, AFP, and Interfax)
TATARSTAN'S OUTSPOKEN ACTIVIST GETS ONE-YEAR SUSPENDED SENTENCE
CHALLY, Russia -- A well-known Tatar writer, activist, and leader of the self-proclaimed pan-Tatar Milli Mejlis (National Assembly) has received a suspended one-year prison sentence on charges of inciting ethnic hatred.
The Chally City Court on October 2 found Fauziya Bayramova (eds: a woman) guilty and handed down its sentence.
The court also barred Bayramova from changing her residence in the city of Chally in Russia's Republic of Tatarstan for one year.
Bayramova pleaded not guilty to the charges against her, saying that the case was politically motivated.
Bayramova was charged after she posted two articles to her Facebook page in February condemning Russia's moves toward the annexation of Crimea from Ukraine.
TODAY'S FEATURED POST: WATCH KAREN DAWISHA PRESENT HER BOOK, 'PUTIN'S KLEPTOCRACY,' AT THE WILSON CENTER
I had the pleasure of having Karen as a guest on the Power Vertical Podcast back in April. She's well worth listening to and I am looking forward to reading her book. So if you have a free 90 minutes, it would be well spent watching this video.
EPIC RANT BY ILYA KLISHIN: GO AHEAD, SHUT OFF THE INTERNER, IMPRISON NAVALNY. ENOUGH ALREADY!
Ilya Klishin, editor of Dozhd-TV's website, has an epic rant up in which he sarcastically, and effectively, rips apart everything the Kremlin is doing: from Internet controls to the Ukraine intervention to the Navalny trial.
Watch it here.
GREF SPOILS THE PARTY AT VTB FORUM
On his Twitter feed today, Aleksei Navalny asked an interesting, and relevant, question: "Why did German Gref get more applause than anybody else" at the VTB investment forum in Moscow.
In his remarks at the forum, Gref slammed waste and inefficiency in the Russian economy, which he sais is in danger of returning to Soviet times.
Watch video of Gref's speech and Navalny's commentary on it here.
EVENING NEWS ROUNDUP, OCTOBER 3
Some items from RFE/RL's News Desk:
RUSSIA WANTS TRIBUNAL TO PROBE ALLEGED DONETSK MASS GRAVES
Russian Duma speaker Sergei Naryshkin has told the OSCE that "crimes against humanity" have been committed in Ukraine and that those responsible must face an international tribunal.
Naryshkin made the remarks on October 3 in Geneva to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).
He said Russia insists that an international tribunal investigate what he called "the mass graves" of people he alleges were "brutally tortured and slain" in eastern Ukraine's Donetsk region.
Russian media have reported that an "OSCE expert" confirmed the existence of two mass graves with more than 400 bodies near Donetsk.
But the OSCE said on October 1 that the man making those claims, Latvian political activist Einars Graudins, is not a member of the OSCE monitoring mission and "has no link whatsoever" with the OSCE.
Graudins' mass grave claims have not been independently confirmed.
(With reporting by Interfax and ITAR-TASS)
LAVROV TELLS KERRY UKRAINE CEASEFIRE MUST BE MAINTAINED
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has spoken to U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry about the "need" to maintain a cease-fire in eastern Ukraine.
The ministry says Lavrov made the comments during a telephone conversation with Kerry on October 3.
It says Lavrov called for "strict compliance" with a cease-fire agreement signed on September 5 in Minsk, as well as an end to shelling in residential areas of Donetsk -- which is under the control of pro-Russian separatists.
A dozen civilians have been killed in and around Donetsk during the past week, including a Swiss Red Cross worker killed by a mortar shell on October 2.
Separatists have been shelling and attempting to capture the government-controlled airport in Donetsk.
Ukraine's government and separatists blamed each other for the Swiss aid worker's death.
Russia says he was killed by Ukrainian government forces.
(Based on reporting by Interfax and ITAR-TASS)
PUTIN SIGNS EURASIAN ECONOMIC UNION TREATY RATIFICATION
Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed the law ratifying the treaty on the creation of the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) between Russia, Belarus, and Kazakhstan.
Putin made the announcement on October 3 during a government meeting.
Under the treaty, the EEU will begin functioning as of January 1, 2015. It intensifies the economic cooperation among the three countries that was begun with the Russian-led Customs Union.
The presidents of the three countries are scheduled to meet in Minsk on October 10 to exchange ratification documents.
Armenia is also set to join the agreement in the near future. "All four of us are beginning to build a single economic space," Russian Deputy Economic Development Minister Aleksei Likhachyov was quoted by ITAR-TASS as saying.
(Based on reporting by Interfax and ITAR-TASS)
RUSSIA TO HONOR WWII ARCTIC CONVOY VETERANS
The Russian Embassy in Britain will honor 30 World War II veterans on October 3 for their part in transporting crucial supplies to Russia.
The BBC reports the medals will be presented to the men of the Arctic Convoys during a ceremony in Southampton.
A similar ceremony took place at the Russian embassy on September 30 for 53 veterans.
The Ushakov medal is awarded to sailors who have displayed courage in the course of defending Russia or its interests.
Between 1941 and 1945, 78 Allied Arctic convoys brought more than 4 million tons of provisions and munitions to the U.S.S.R.
More than 1,400 merchant ships and naval vessels participated in the convoys to the Russian arctic ports of Arkhangelsk and Murmansk, braving harsh weather conditions and German attacks.
More than 3,000 lives were lost by the time the war ended.
(Based on reporting by the BBC)
KYIV SAYS YANUKOVYCH OBTAINED RUSSIAN CITIZENSHIP
A Ukrainian official says ex-President Viktor Yanukovych and other former top officials have obtained Russian citizenship.
Ukrainian Interior Minister's aide Anton Herashchenko wrote on Facebook on October 3 that President Vladimir Putin signed a "secret decree" granting Russian citizenship to Yanukovych, former Prime Minister Mykola Azarov, ex-Prosecutor-General Viktor Pshonka, and members of their families.
Ukraine has launched criminal investigations against the three former top officials, accusing them of responsibility for the killings of unarmed demonstrators.
The three fled Ukraine on the wake of antigovernment protests in late-February.
Speaking to Ekho Moskvy radio on October 3, Putin's press secretary Dmitry Peskov refused to comment on Herashchenko's statement.
Officials at Russia's Federal Immigration Service also declined to comment.
(Based on reporting by UNIAN, Ekho Moskvy and Interfax)
THREE MILITANTS KILLED, POLICE OFFCER WOUNDED IN DAGHESTAN
Russian authorities say police in the North Caucasus republic of Daghestan have killed at least three militants.
Daghestan’s law enforcement officials said the militants were buried under the rubbles of a house during a security operation in the village of Vremenny of Untsukul district on October 2.
One police officer was wounded during the operation.
No civilian casualties have been reported.
Daghestan and other republics in Russia's restive North Caucasus region have been plagued by violence linked to Islamic extremism and organized crime for years, with scores of people being killed and injured.
Based on reporting by Interfax and TASS