From Volume 36, Issue 44 of EIR Online, Published Nov. 13, 2009
Russia and the CIS News Digest

Russian Scholar Calls for U.S.-Russian Alliance Against London

Nov. 7 (EIRNS)—Igor Panarin, a noted Russian analyst and publicist who is also a professor at the Diplomatic Academy of the Russian Foreign Affairs Ministry, called on the U.S. and Russia to form an alliance to fight the London financial oligarchy, at a forum in Washington sponsored by the Friends of Russia and America Goodwill Association on Nov. 3. Talking about the global financial collapse, Panarin indicated that China had been awaiting action by the U.S. to support the dollar until the Pittsburgh summit of the G20, when it was clear that nothing would be done. "The elites failed to rally to the call to resolve the problem," he said. "I feel that also the large corporations in England may be interested in bringing down the dollar."

While speculating that there would develop three centers of economic power (the European Union, a "Eurasian bloc" based on the ruble, and a Pacific bloc that included the U.S. but would be led by China), he declared: "You know, Russia twice saved the United States, once under Catherine the Great in her support of the American Revolution, and then during the Civil War, when Alexander II sent the Russian fleet to both U.S. coasts to keep the British at bay." Panarin then called for a "U.S.-Russian alliance against the London transnational financial interests."

EIR laid out the LaRouche Four-Power agreement for building a new credit system, noting the recent China-Russia agreements as opening the door to such a development. Although Panarin is most noted for his predictions of the United States breaking up like the Soviet Union did under the pressure of the present economic crisis, he is well aware of LaRouche and his policies and cites him publicly on occasion.

Ivashov Charges Gorbachov with Neglect of Western 1989 Geopolitics

Nov. 5 (EIRNS)—In an exclusive interview with the Novosti information agency, Leonid Ivashov, former head of the international relations department at the Russian Defense Ministry, criticized former U.S.S.R. leader Mikhail Gorbachov for his appeasement of NATO, which led to an otherwise avoidable strategic disadvantage for the Soviets in 1989-90.

"When the Soviet troops were pulled out from Germany, the Soviet state leadership, and later on, the one of Russia, made serious political mistakes," Ivashov said. "Gorbachov and [U.S.S.R. Foreign Minister Eduard] Shevardnadze did everything to please the West. I have seen how good positions were given up. Instead, compromises should have been sought that were acceptable to all parties. There should have been discussion about the status of Germany, the non-expansion of NATO, and the pull-out of the Alliance from Germany. NATO was willing to discuss that."

Gorbachov claimed, said Ivashov, that "all of these concessions were made to him verbally. What kind of untalented leader is that, who does not grasp the nature of the geopolitical struggle and does not see the necessity to lay down all these verbal concessions in binding documents?"

"As a managing director of the Defense Ministry (1987 to 1992), I worked with financial experts to calculate what the troop pull-out would cost us, and we arrived at a sum of more than $100 billion," Ivashov added. "Gorbachov personally cut this sum down to a tenth." German Chancellor Helmut Kohl and Gorbachov then signed a treaty which gave the Russians 12 billion German marks, of which 8 billion were used to build 45,000 homes or apartments for Army officers in Russia.

Gazprom CEO Medvedev Interviewed on Russian-Italian Project

Nov. 3 (EIRNS)—Russian Gazprom deputy CEO Alexander Medvedev [no relation to President Dmitri Medvedev] granted an interview today to the Italian state television channel Raitre, on the South Stream project—the Russian-Italian 900-kilometer underwater gas pipeline across the Black Sea from Russia to Bulgaria.

"The decision to upgrade South Stream's capacity from 31 to 63 [billion cubic meters per year], doubling it, is very important, because through such a diversification there will be a system of diversified supplies of natural gas from Russia to Europe." The project aims at "increasing security of supplies, thanks also to the construction of underground stocking plants, which we are committed to. It will be possible to create a system of reliable supplies of natural gas, a stable system."

This renewed discussion of South Stream comes in the midst of agitation around Russian gas supplies to Europe, once again, due in part to the insolvency of Ukraine, which is unable to pay for Russian gas shipments.

Deals Between Italy and Kazakstan

Nov. 6 (EIRNS)—More than 20 bilateral agreements were signed between Italy and Kazakstan during Kazakstan President Nursultan Nazarbayev's visit to Rome on Nov. 5. The deals concern "several billion dollars," Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi said, and include oil exploration and processing, chemical, railways, aerospace, and other industrial sectors. In the forefront is a deal between ENI and KazMunayGas for the development of two giant oil fields in the Caspian Sea: Isatay and Shagala. If the technical and commercial surveys are to be turned in contracts, they will require investments of $10-12 billion, ENI CEO Paolo Scaroni said. ENI will also upgrade a refinery in Pavlodar and build a plant for gas "sweetening" ($3-5 billion), and possibly fertilizer plants.

This is a "Mattei-like" agreement, Scaroni said, referring to the late ENI founder Enrico Mattei, who challenged the British colonial system by offering technology to oil-producing countries in exchange for oil.

British Monetarism Spreads Flu to Ukraine

Nov. 3 (EIRNS)—The rapid spread of a flu-like disease through Ukraine, whose population has already been decimated by the globalization policies of the British Empire through the International Monetary fund, since 1992, is the result of a London-directed genocide policy. While it is urgent that Ukraine receive help to improve its ability to diagnose and treat the illness, there is no hope for the reversal of the crisis—either in Ukraine or anywhere in the world—without taking on the political powers that are enforcing a genocide policy, especially in health care.

"We have to shut down the power of those who are destroying the health-care system internationally," Lyndon LaRouche commented today. "There is no solution to this international flu crisis without going directly at the British and U.S. governments—and their collaborators in the IMF—who are dictating mass-murderous policies to governments internationally." There is no way that we or anyone else can whip up a cure for the flu problem, LaRouche elaborated: You have to eliminate the political problem causing it. "Don't complain about the flu, unless you are working to knock out the Nazi health-care policy of Obama and the British."

At the end of October, President Victor Yushchenko signed a law that raised pensions and the minimum wage by 10-20%. Immediately, the bankers' mouthpieces blamed the measure, which raises the pension from a miserly $75 to $95 a month, for driving deficits out of control. The IMF's managing director Dominique Strauss-Kahn said he's "worried" by these developments, implicitly threatening to withhold the last tranche of a 2008 IMF loan to Ukraine, amounting to $3.8 billion.

On Oct. 28, Finance Minister Ihor Umanskiy announced that Ukraine would ask the IMF's governors council for permission to use the last part of the loan to finance the budget deficit. Then, on Oct. 30, after the IMF made it known it could block the last part of the loan to Ukraine, Standard & Poor's lowered its rating of Ukraine's debt, already very low, and estimated that the IMF decision "would undermine investors' confidence in the banking system and increase pressure on the Ukrainian currency."

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