Regulate This

While today's headline is clearly the Bulgaria - Russia South Stream deal, we have to give credit to our very own V. V. Putin for this month's "New Achievment in Logic" award.

After announcing the South Stream deal, Putin added that he "saw no point in continuing to be a signatory to the European Energy Charter after it failed to regulate Moscow's dispute with Ukraine over transit to Europe in January.”

Uh, failed to regulate?

1) Russia hasn't even ratified the charter; 2) Putin doesn't care what it says anyway; But 3) Russia cannot continue as a signatory because it didn't 'keep the Ukrainians in line' (read: we shut off the gas in the first place)?

As each day passes, it is becoming harder to tell if Putin is one of the most amazing sophists to ever live, or he just lives in a happy Putin place where all of this makes sense.

Europe's Dictators* Pose for the Cameras

FP Passport: Belarussian President Aleksandr Lukashenko's PR machine kicked into overdrive yesterday during a meeting with Pope Benedict. Said Belarussian opposition leader Anatoly Lebedko:

Lukashenko's main goal is to improve his image and to receive absolution from the pope ahead of the EU summit in Prague, where many European politicians will not extend a hand to the Belarusian dictator.

You know what could improve your image, Lukashenko? Free some prisoners, allow some freedom of speech, and if you could just generally tone down the crazy, that would be fantastic!

*According to dictionary.com, a dictator is "a person exercising absolute power, esp. a ruler who has absolute, unrestricted control in a government without hereditary succession."

Kasparov: Master or Amateur?

Excite News: Chess master Garry Kasparov staged a guerrilla hit-and-run protests against the Kremlin on Wednesday, showing up at the criminal trial of Mikhail Khodorkovsky and engaging in a brief, heated debate with one of the prosecutors. Kasparov and other supporters of Khodorkovsky say he is chiefly guilty of making an enemy of former President Vladimir Putin.

When the judge ordered a recess, Kasparov confronted prosecutor Gyulchekhra Ibragimova as she walked past him on her way out. During the brief and tense exchange, Ibragimova told Kasparov she respected him but added he should have been playing chess rather than wasting his time in court.

"You are an amateur" in the courtroom, she told him.

"Get your hands off my country"

This week, one of Poland’s most renowned concert pianists, Krystian Zimerman, suddenly interrupted a performance in LA to unveil his new calling in life: geo-political commentator.

Oh, and boy does he have a lot to comment about:

"Get your hands off my country," Zimerman told the stunned crowd in a denunciation of US plans to install a missile defense shield on Polish soil. Some people cheered, others yelled at him to shut up and keep playing. A few dozen walked out, some of them shouting obscenities."

To be fair, Zimerman has some reason to be upset. Notes the Guardian, “Shortly after 9/11, his piano was confiscated by customs officials at New York's JFK airport, who thought the glue smelled funny. They subsequently destroyed the instrument.”

Yet somehow, “Get your hands off my piano” doesn’t have the same flair.

Ukraine will be safe from Swine Flu!

Measels, mumps, whooping cough, hepatitis B, tuberculosis... those are another story.

But according to Ms. Yulia's blog, the government will approve several measures to protect Ukraine from the spread of the swine flu virus. There have been no cases of swine flu in Ukraine so far. According to Tymoshenko, the Government is taking all the necessary measures to prevent the virus from reaching Ukrainian territory. Special points are being set up at border crossings to examine people with visual signs of the illness. Staff will by confiscating animal and plant products from hand luggage.

Seriously, Ukraine, you have had two measels outbreaks since the turn of the century, and that's with people handing you free vaccines. You're going to worry about swine flu?

Economy Update: Serbia Goes Crazy for Cannibalism

The economy is bad, for sure. But did you know that the global recession has forced Serb textile workers to use cannibalism as a protest?

"We, the workers have nothing to eat, we had to seek some sort of alternative food and I gave them an example," Zoran Bulatovic told Reuters. "It hurt like hell."

It hurt, because Bulatovic chopped his finger off to make the point and to prevent one of his underlings, "a single mother of three," from doing the deed herself. Bulatovic, you see, wanted to be a gentleman about it. "[She was] the first to say she would cut off her finger. I could not allow her to do that."

Somehow this Serbian cannibalism business is really getting legs, or more accuretly: feet.

You see, in February, a Ms. Radmila Stojadinovic, resident of Lucica, Serbia reportedly ate her sister's foot after "sleeping on her dead body for a month." Apparetnly, "When the police came to see Radmila, she was very weak, had soot on her face and 10-centimeter fingernails," according to the Kurir Daily.

Poor cops. That is definetly going to require a session with the police psychologist.

Tale of woe by the meatcounter

The body count in ER has been dropping as of late, so thankfully we have a story of the absurd from Gliwice Sosnica, Poland.  

A customer dies by the meat counter in a Biedronka store around 9 AM.  The meatlady tries to resuscitate him but the bad hair, makeup, and attitude does not win him back to life. Doctor comes and declares the man dead.  He lies in the aisle of the store in  bodybag for two hours while the rest of the store goes on with business as usual. Customers start tripping over the body bag.  Customers complain to management.  Management responds with dirty looks.  Eventually someone calls the press and the body is removed.  Store does not shut down for a minute. 

Enemy of the State

To steal a line from Gene Hackman in Enemy of the State, Anton Chumachenko is either incredibly smart, or incredibly stupid.

This first time United Russia candidate has "publicly renounced his own victory, expressing disgust that votes had been falsified in his favor." Yeah, he really did it:

"I am sincerely convinced that my colleagues in the party will support my position and make all efforts to make sure that the rule of law prevails," he wrote. "The party's strength lies not in exaggerated percentages of support, but in its ability to stand up for the truth."

Now, this is either one of the most brilliant self-promotion campaigns ever (how else could a 23-year old United Russia small-timer make it onto the front page of the Washington Post) or he's alarmingly naïve. United Russia's only strength lies in the exaggerated appearance of public support...oh yes, and all that violence and prision time for people who do not play by the rules.

Khordokovsky might soon have a bunkmate, or not. See Gene Hackman above.

Obama Flips on Armenian "Genocide?"

Today, President Obama will mark the heart-breaking events of 1915 in Armenia with a statement that explicitly avoids any mention of the word "genocide." The White House calims that Obama is not reversing from his position on the campaign trail, since "He has his views, and his views are known." More to come, for sure.

Postcards from Moldova

Democracy is awesome.

2010 is the New 2012

It looks like the Mayans might have it wrong. The world will not end in 2012, as the calendar implies, but next year when Russia runs out of oil money.

According to new comments from Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin, the Russian government will have fully depleted the nation’s $120 billion oil reserve fund by 2010. Thanks to the Kremlin’s ill-fated quest to support the ruble and lavish support for money-loosing business, the lock-box of Russia's energy wealth will be empty in little more than a year.

Also reported, Russia’s economy shrank by 9.5% in the first three months of 2009. Definetly time to stock up on shot-guns and dry goods. That doomsday cult might have been onto something.

Tweeting from Home, Now

In honor of Moldova’s “Twitter Revolution," we’ll do this in 140 characters or less…

Twitter master Natalia Morar is house arrested in Moldova. “Inciting mass disorder” the charge. Hasn’t been tortured, yet. Thinks Kremlin is behind crackdown.

And if that seems way to brief to do the story justice, now you know why I dispise Twitter.

Russia Wants its Soviet Tobacco Back

Once upon a time, there was a magical world in which the workers of the world united into a Union of Socialist Republics. It was a myth, because everyone knew that some workers (Russians) were more equal than others.

So what does any of this have to do with tobacco? Well, as part of its negotiations with Bulgaria over the proposed South Stream gas pipeline, Moscow has claimed ownership of Bulgartabac (granted to the USSR as a spoil of war in 1945). Now, Russia wants it back.

"We are set to reclaim all properties that lie abroad and belonged to the Soviet Union. Bulgartabac will not be an exception," said Vladimir Kozhin, head of the
Presidential Property Management Department of the Russian Federation.

Wait just one second, you say… How can Russia claim Bulgartabac as a property of the Soviet Union, when the Russian SSR was just a single republic within a broader Union of Socialist Republics. Couldn't the other former SSR's also claim ownership of Bulgartabac?

Nope. Just Russia, according to Kozhin.

So ends the myth of Soviet equality. Argubably, that myth died a painful death sometime around the time when the National Soviet of the Ukrainian Socialist Republic started passing laws in direct contradiction to the USSR constitution, or maybe it was that moment in which Yeltsin climbed on top of a tank. But this one is just too juicy.

Note to our Estonian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Belarusian, Ukranian, Moldovan, Georgian, Armenian, Azeri, Uzbek, Kazakh, and Tajik friends: you might also want to file a claim, lest Russia take what -- by rights -- also belongs to you...

Sorry Bulgaria. All power to the People's Soviets!

Save Angela Merkel

Last week, FP Magazine published a list of the “Top Five Governments that Deserve to Fail.” And since we're just now learning to about the wonders of Google Timeline, ER can finally catch up on all the crap we missed.

In the, not-a-surprise-to-anyone catagory, we discover that both Russia and Georgia are on the list. But Angela Merkel's Germany?

According to the editors, Saakashvili has got to go for his “economic and foreign-policy incompetence;” Putin deserves the boot for, eh, “failing to enact economic policies that would have aided Russia through the financial crisis” (how very brave of you FP); and someone should show Angela the door for “naysaying other countries' policies.”

Naysaying? Where the hell is Kim Jong-il?

Go for the Gold

The first contentious race of the 2014 Sochi Olympics has already begun, with multiple false-starts and disqualifications for the Mayoral candidate. At stake is access to the vast state coffers for the Olympic preparations as well as control over a favorite summertime spot for President Medvedev and Prime Minister Putin.

In a frenzy for control over this political resource, Sochi has had four mayors in the last year alone and at one time over 25 candidates were registered for the election next week. Of the original 25, only 6 remain. Amongst the throng, famous ballerina Anastasia Volochkova, businessman and British favorite Aleksandr Lebedev, and Just Russia's candidate Viktor Kurpitko have been eliminated for various paperwork issues. Despite the scandal surrounding a large foreign campaign contribution, former Deputy Prime Minister Boris Nemtsov has managed to recover from his early lagging pace and is considered the only viable competition left for United Russia's candidate, acting Sochi Mayor Anatoly Pakhomov.

Russian television stations have decided not to cover this election; no doubt the powers that be do not want another Murmansk debacle. Although hopefully Pakhomov has been filled in better on election policies than Anton Chumachenko (for more on this idealistic United Russia see here).

Berlin Wall Divides East and West Again

According to The Guardian, there are plans to repaint what remains of the Berlin Wall, roughly 1300 meters of concrete.

Noir, the Frenchman who painted the first major work of art on the wall, is now organizing the restoration of his paintings as well as those of around 120 other artists. The artists, representing 21 countries, will return to Berlin to paint the wall after it has been scrubbed and resurfaced. So how is this project dividing rather than uniting?

The Russian artist Dmitri Vrubel, who painted the famous image of the East German leader Erich Honecker kissing his Soviet counterpart, Leonid Brezhnev, has told German media he would not paint the same image as before. Noir dismissed the Russian artist, whose "kiss" painting has graced T-shirts, coffee mugs and posters in dorm rooms across Europe for decades, as a publicity-seeker.

Maybe we should just knock down the rest of the wall? Maybe repaint the original designs on paper or something?

Russia Being Cool?

Two stories from the NY Times that just warm your heart.

1. Medvedev has asked that the bill to expand the definition of espionage and state treason — a measure backed by Putin — be revised. What What?!

The bill had prompted a strong outcry in the media and among government critics, and Mr. Medvedev’s request appears to represent a rare example of public opinion influencing policy in Russia, a country with strict controls on free expression of divergent political ideas.

Critics had said that the bill would have needlessly broadened the understanding of actions considered detrimental to Russia’s security and allowed officials to equate any government criticism with state treason.

2. Russia may be putting off its plan to deploy missiles near the Polish border raised. The reports have not been confirmed, but if the speculation is good enough for the New York Times, it's good enough for me to mention here. I mean I speculated last week that by calling Moldova the poorest country in Europe, the NYT was in fact saying Kosovo was not a country. I'm in no position to judge.

In any case, thanks for being cool, Russia, even if it is temporary or not confirmed.

Bedazzled

In its latest installment of Russian military modernization, the latest in anti-pirate technology has been unveiled. The aptly named "Dazzle Rifle" the design for which was no doubt based upon multiple viewings of the "Fifth Element," emits an extremely bright light which causes temporary blindness; thus preventing small boat approaches. Yargh!

(They've also created the DP-54, a grenade launcher capable of discharging without creating a jet stream, but it's not nearly as awesome looking.)

Who's Your Daddy

Despite the title, this is actually a very sad story. As many of us are aware, financial and economic pressures have driven many Tajik men to seek work outside of the country and left Tajik women with few job prospects. As a result, there has been a steep increase in the number of 25+ women marrying men between the ages of 60 and 70. Not surprisingly, the regions where these marriages are most common have also witnessed a rising divorce rate. [edit: new photo since the old one died.]

"Oh Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Tree...."

This actual sentence appeared in the UK’s Guardian yesterday:

"And so to the Urals, where medics are reported to have removed a tiny fir tree from a man's lung, after he complained of chest pains." That's right, an actual fir tree. A really small one, at least. "Before doctors opened him up, they were convinced he had lung cancer. Now, they're convinced [28-year-old Artyom Sidorkin] inhaled a seed, which sprouted inside him.”

Now, before you hypochondriacs latch on to a new medical fear, we must point out that the original story has also graced the pages of Pravda, that bastion of journalistic integrity. So, caveat emptor everyone, if you are inclined to buy this story.

(Thanks Leopolis!)