International Affairs No. 1, 2017 – Table of Contents

Deputy Foreign Minister of the Russian Federation

Armen Oganesyan, Editor-in-Chief, International Affairs: Sergey Alexeyevich, the outgoing year will be remembered, among other foreign policy events, for the election of the 45th U.S. president, Republican Donald Trump. Over the past eight years, we have interacted with the Democratic administration of Barack Obama. What are the results? …

ON DECEMBER 31, 2016, Ban Ki-moon will end his term as the eighth UN secretary general, spending two terms at the organization’s helm – a total of 10 years. It so happens that I have observed his work all these years, closely interacting with the secretary general by virtue of our country’s status as a permanent member of the UN Security Council, bearing a special responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security. This article is about Ban Ki-moon’s initiatives and reforms, as well as their results, which he is leaving to his successor, Portugal’s Antonio Guterres.

Summing up the results of Ban Ki-moon’s term of office as UN secretary general, it should be recognized that on the whole, he has proven himself as a competent politician and administrator who has managed to preserve the UN’s central coordinating role in global affairs despite the emergence of acute threats and challenges. …

BEHIND THE POLICY of Western countries and their allies toward Russia in the Ukrainian crisis is a long-term strategy adopted by key Western powers, and the Ukrainian conflict is just one manifestation of this strategy. Claims by the United States that it is the world leader, far from raising any objections from its allies, are supported by them in every way.

Rich nations in Europe and other continents unanimously want the current global division of labor between the “golden billion” countries and the “world periphery” to be continued. This unifying motive cannot be shaken by economic and political issues that arise between Western countries time and again. …

TODAY, some of the key trends in the Middle Eastern subsystem of international relations are shaped and are unfolding under pressure of extraregional powers and the foreign policy they realize in the region. The United States is one of these powers; this means that a better understanding of the causes and essense of certain processes going on in the region calls for a closer study of Washington’s politics and the instruments it uses to achieve its foreign policy aims.

The Range of Instruments …

THE MILITARY REFORM announced by the top leadership of the Communist Party of China (CPC) and the Chinese cabinet in 2015 is a large-scale and in-depth enterprise. It aims to impart a new quality to the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) and other armed services.

The reform is, among other things, an important factor in China’s foreign policy as the military will apparently play a larger role in the national security system. …

Armen Oganesyan, Editor-in-Chief of International Affairs: As is known, there are about 4 billion users of the Internet, which offers unlimited possibilities. However, not all users are aware of the threats that are posed by the World Wide Web or how information security is ensured on the Internet.

A little later, Iran retaliated: According to media reports, it attacked the U.S. banking system. Some U.S. banks spend billions on their protection but nevertheless it did not work and they sustained considerable damage. …

Armen Oganesyan, Editor-in-Chief of International Affairs: This year, the CIS is 25 years old. There is a view that the CIS facilitated a civilized divorce of the Soviet republics. What do you think about it?

It was necessary to somehow extinguish these conflicts and find peaceful solutions to the disputes. And the CIS was able to resolve these problems in the early stages of its existence: to end the civil war in Tajikistan and the bloodshed in Nagorno-Karabakh and Transnistria. But when these conflicts were defused, many other problems associated with the civilized divorce of the former Soviet republics came to the fore. These included mutual settlements, primarily in the economic sphere; the need to address transportation, energy supply and communication problems; and the existence of many social problems such as payment of pensions and pension arrears to citizens of the former Soviet Union (FSU), provision of healthcare services, mutual recognition of diplomas, etc. …

“THE WORLD is made of achieved Utopias. Today’s utopia is tomorrow’s reality,”¹ said Frederic Passy, winner of the first Nobel Peace Prize and one of the two co-founders (together with William Randal Cremer) of the oldest international parliamentary organization.

The idea of bringing together members of parliament from different countries for a joint effort in the name of peace and international cooperation was first expressed at the end of the 19th century. Parliamentarians from Austria, Spain, France, and Britain discussed the idea of an international assembly that would act primarily as an arbitrator in the settlement of international disputes.² …

NORMALLY, the military, political, economic and social factors are fairly obvious and, therefore, are treated as the key objects of situational analysis and political science assessments in foreign policy planning and forcasting. On the other hand, values, ideologies, political will, and motivations require special attention as the factors the vagueness of which is created by considerable cultural distinctions, specifics of outlooks and self-awareness of different people living in different states.

Mass psychology and political psychology are moving to the fore as the most required and promising trends of studies outside which it is impossible to grasp the regularities of the social-political processes needed for modeling and forecasting. The impressive body of what has been written on the subject in Russia is the best confirmation of the interest in the subject in our country¹ even though the dynamics of its studies is not as impressive as in Europe and the United States: they developed an interest in political psychology back in the 1960s and since then moved to the leading positions.² …

IN 1983, VLADIMIR LUKIN* brought out a book that became a landmark not only for the Institute for the U.S. and Canadian Studies of the Soviet Academy of Sciences, where he worked at that time, but for the entire Soviet scholarly community. It was per se remarkable that the book, entitled Centers of Power: Concepts and Realities, was published at a time when, let me remind you, the Soviet-American confrontation and the rivalry between the two world systems reached their peak and, let’s face it, each system professed an ideology that essentially painted a black-and-white picture of the world and claimed to be superior to the other system. Few people could have thought in those days that that state of affairs could come to an end any time soon. The United States was getting ready for a grueling struggle with the Soviets. Almost nobody in either country thought that any third party would ever come forward and throw down the gauntlet to the world’s two superpowers. Each system was getting ready for its own historic victory and saw the rest of the world as so many pieces on the chessboard.

A Legacy to Comprehend …

THROUGHOUT SEVERAL DECADES, starting with the 1970s, political life in France was unfolding as the right-left opposition. Strong political alliances on both sides and the majority electoral system made second rounds of presidential and parliamentary elections inevitable. Dichotomy was spread to the country’s entire population: all and every Frenchman referred himself/herself to one of the political flanks, the political bias being normally inherited from the older generations. We can even say that the right or left political preferences have become one of the most important self-identification features of the citizens of the Fifth Republic.

For many years, political life in France was structured by the struggle between the right and left ideas, an ideal confrontation responsible for the positions on the key political, social and economic issues: the degree to which the state could interfere in economy; school education (state or private); working hours; centralization or decentralization of the country; proportionate or progressive taxation, and the death penalty issue. This dichotomy reached its peak under President François Mitterrand in the 1980s. …

UNTIL THE EARLY 1960S, modern political Islam did not have much influence in the Arab world or in the Middle East. There was an ongoing conflict in the region between nationalists, who were supported by the Soviet Union, and conservative regimes, which were supported by the West. Over time, radical movements managed to build a political consensus to strengthen their influence. However, the gradual escalation of insoluble problems triggered the onset of the destruction of political nationalism. In addition, radical public trends outwardly emulated European radicalism.

As a result, popular religious-political culture developed over time. Despite the colonial character of the policy of Western powers, Islam not only remained but was employed by adherents to the Islamic religion as a tool in the liberation struggle during the period of the domination of Western European states. The preservation of Islamic legal norms was a factor in Islamic religious influence. This phenomenon can also be related to the consolidation of traditionalist culture arising from religious consciousness. …

(International Conference)

Opening Speeches …

IN THE SPRING OF 2017, we will celebrate the 25th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between the Russian Federation and the Republic of Tajikistan. The above period is characterized by a lot of important developments in the relations between the two countries, and a solid groundwork has also been laid for a progressive development of multifaceted bilateral interaction in the future. In this context, I would like to share with the readers my vision of what have been achieved in the past 25 years, as well as of the future prospects for the Russian-Tajik relations.

To begin with, I would like to emphasize that the relations between our two peoples were established long before the aforementioned historical date: Russia and Tajikistan have a centuries-old tradition of the most intense interaction and time-tested relations of enduring friendship. …

MONGOLIA AND RUSSIA have long enjoyed traditionally friendly relations. Russia was the first state to officially recognize the independence of our country and establish diplomatic relations with Mongolia. Treaty on the Establishment of Friendly Relations Between Mongolia and the Russian Federation signed on November 5, 1921 not only laid the groundwork for official relations between the two countries, but also consolidated our independence. Being close neighbors, we shared both hardships in the years of trials and successes during peacetime. Mongolia’s further close relations and cooperation with the Soviet Union were crucial for defending its independence and territorial integrity in 1939, recognizing Mongolia’s sovereignty in 1945 by the leading world powers, as well as for the country’s joining the United Nations in 1961 as its full member. It is those heartwarming traditions based on the sincere feelings of friendship and mutual attraction prevailing among the peoples of Mongolia and Russia that determine the development of our relations.

The framework documents which define Mongolia’s foreign policy, such as the Concept of the National Security and the Concept of the Foreign Policy, indicate that the deepening and development of good-neighborly relations with the Russian Federation is one of the priority areas of Mongolia’s foreign policy. In 2009, Russia became the first state with which we established strategic partnership in the twenty-first century. …

International Affairs: Yury Petrovich, how would you generally characterize the present politico-economic situation in Spain and what, in your view, are the prospects for the country’s development in the short term?

Yu. Korchagin: You know, diplomats usually refrain from making public political evaluations of the situation in the country of their accreditation. Nevertheless, an article of the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations of 1961 that refers to ascertaining by all lawful means conditions and developments in the receiving state gives us some room to maneuver. Based on it, I will tell you the following. Local public opinion polls show that Spaniards cite unemployment, corruption, and the economic situation among the country’s main problems. The statements that are made by the country’s leadership and political party leaders suggest that there is an understanding about the need to deal with these problems. And quite a bit has already been done. So my forecast for the prospects of the country’s development is optimistic. …

CHINESE-RUSSIAN FRIENDSHIP is deeply rooted in historical realities. The People’s Republic of China was proclaimed on October 1, 1949. On the next day, the PRC and the USSR established diplomatic relations, and the Soviet Union became the first country to officially recognize new China. During those years, Chinese-Soviet, and subsequently Chinese-Russian relations went through many trials and stood the test of time. Being stable, robust, and mature, they have become a model of intergovernmental relations in the modern world. Chinese-Russian relations have been currently going through the most favorable period in their history, maintaining their high level and thus benefitting the peoples of both countries.

Some twenty years ago, proceeding from a broad historic experience and the fundamental interests of the peoples of the two countries and concentrating their aspirations on the future, the leaders of both countries decided to establish Chinese-Russian relations of strategic interaction and partnership with the view to meeting challenges of the twenty-first century. Fifteen years ago, the parties signed the Chinese-Russian Treaty of Good-Neighborliness, Friendship and Cooperation, which has laid down a solid legal groundwork for the promotion of long-term good-neighborly relations, friendship, and mutually beneficial cooperation between the two countries. Twelve years ago, they unanimously reached agreement on a comprehensive settlement of the border issue, which served as a serious guarantee of eternal friendship, good-neighborliness, and cooperation between our two nations. …

SOME TWENTY-FIVE YEARS ago, those who in the old dispute about the role of the individual in history argued that success of political initiatives depended on the ability of state leaders to look into the future acquired another argument. Tired of the string of failed reforms inside the country and trying to get rid of the tag of failures, the Soviet “architects of perestroika” turned their attention to the global world. A talented man is talented in everything: by the same token, once a failure always a failure. The predecessors of the “Pokemon catchers” of our times borrowed the Anglo-American derogatory “looser,” an apt definition of the “foremen of Soviet perestroika”: the accolades piled up on them in the West transformed into tragic failures inside the country they ventured to make happy.

He Who Sups With the Devil Should Have a Long Spoon …

DECEMBER 1991 is one of the most controversial periods in our country’s recent history. Some people consider it a tragic time – the vast Soviet Union, a great power and our great home, ceased to exist. For others, it was the start of a new, free, democratic life with new opportunities and prospects.

At that time, a quarter of a century ago, the State Committee for Television and Radio (Gosteleradio) decided to reform the huge system it presided over by splitting it into independent television and radio channels. That was how the classical music service was transformed into what became our country’s only specialist radio station for classical music, Radio Orpheus. The story of the station’s name reflected the spirit of those times. Its author still works for the radio. From two names put before Gosteleradio’s top brass – Garmoniya (Harmony) and Orpheus (Orpheus), – they chose the latter, gender being the stated reason (garmoniya is a feminine noun in Russian). …