Outlook After the capture of Grozny, Russia's power brutal war against N the Chechen people continues in the southern mountains in even more difficult Vladimir terrain against a guerrilla army of national liberation. Yeltsin's While the siege of Grozny was approaching its successful endorsed conclusion, President Boris The Yeltsin, after nearly ten years in power, suddenly stepped down in favour of his protégé. It is appropriate at this juncture that socialists re-assess what is going on in Russian the ex-Soviet Union, and ask: What kind of society is being created by the "free market" and "Shock Therapy"? Here DAVE PACKER discusses some of the the issues. prime genocide". Party The Dauphin takes sooner had seats! Significantly, dramatically between President of the Russian Federation - on the Unity, than the Russian Dauphin, Putin, moved quickiy into ine Aremiin to A 13.33% clement deciston to step aside was the extraordinary Duma (parliamentary) elections by Unity, the so-called "Bear' coalition, which was millions the popular Putin, gaining 23.32% of the The vote (64 seats). Zhirinorsky of Unity, SULCEOS and which still rabloko stands at around 75%, can be pur down entirely to politiwar seats. Chechnya - he is scen as a strong man and main archipue own oi fo thaiis and media constituencies. mounted an extended camparga in tavour or Cuity combined Unity, had been hurriedly thrown together only a few in a desperate attempt to defend Yeltsin "family' inter- Duma, altch ests, by cynically benefiting from the kudos derived from The the bloody Chechen wan Another right wing block, following:
neo-liberal get 150- 60 KiRat rorocs, ica by formet 120-130;
Sergei Kussias including Anatoly Chubais and Yegor Gaidar, achiered only 8.52% Vladimir faced they, along with should gang and the IMF, are the main architecrs of "economic Russian defence The votcgof Communist ASOT Russian Federation (CPRF) the the Duma, managed to hold up, raising most likely share by 24.29% although its other allied par- sight.
Man with a plan -ties, the Agrarian Party and Putin Popular Rule, failed to break from relative the 5% threshold to win any his patron to be groomed as Prime Minister an alliance quently heir apparent. He is Unity and the a man in a burry, with poliRight Forces, cies xcarca to together with defectors from for the Presidency. It therefore will mean that the when, after hardly CPRF will no longer be able his Kremlin, he rusbed off to the rote (37seats), front-line in Gudermes near Grozny to give out ornamenFatherland/All Russia, a so'centre-left' bloc, officers in the new day ToHae oy noscow s muayur SCHE Yuriy Luzhkov and former awards. Primakoy. They seem to have minister Yergeniy The Strip voters to ultra nationalist Bloc 5.98% (17 the liberal, also received coalitions did not reach the 5% to gain any Half of the lower house party list system and half on the basis of individual mandate figures are with the so-called independent candidates standine in the 225 scat single constituency section. the final composition of the wacciing and dealing will be different.
distribution of seats will look something like the coldly The CPRF will calculated SOSH Unity: gesture to further Fatherland/All reap the kudos and to ensure 65-70; of the confidence of the miliRight Forces: 30; Yabloko: tary - toe power of tast resolt 25; Zhirinovsky Bloc: 18. in Russia.
Putin, a poker Putin rowed to the TV ex-KUB operative, ChiCes "crush the terrorists" his face. With Grozny now in halt "the break-up and Russian Federation." minister According to The Observer (2/1/2000), at about the same war is nearly over, the linked time Putin successes on the military and Gudermes giving political fronts make him the in the and a third element in his March Presidential clecuons There is no challenger in mogul and Kremlin crony, Boris Berezorsky, was usher- Putin had been plucked ing in the new millennium with a ball at the Bolshoi costing $1,500 per head! His «HU SUOsC TV station was one of those on the air showing Putin live giving the new year Shortly after his visit to Chechnya Putin was obliged SUE TESSE warming to make one of the pav-of!s in the He signed a new presidential decree guarantecing Yeltsin from prosecution for corruption (and probably from offi cial tions). Meanwhile Kremlin officials were searching for a new country dacha tor Ye tsin must outside Moscow. Ihis was parl or the deal, as was a large penwould and and attendance by top mediof the cal experts.
The Yeltsin camp created Putin was nene DOKor out the have plenty fear. The failing ex-President media and his cronies have their SHIC that it could be said that Yeltsin Putin stand state with a criminal mafia most dreaded export.
estimated (Fitch IBCA) that between 1993 and 1998 enormous $130 billion has illegally. single mafia/businessman, Scteen Mickailov, stands accused of laundering Si0bn money thorough the bank of New York investiga- 40% of Russian government spending Most of the IMF's $25 billion sent to Russia since 1992 DHCA into western banks International investigators Senewa London and New York, who were soon on the trail the IMF/World Bank's billions TOSE KOpl coming across the names of Yeltsin's ponacai cronies and members of his Hence the necessity to ensure the succession December, 1999 Outlook) Setaliti Everybody knows that organised crime is linked to the state bureaucracy. In his New Year Address to the tongue in check, that, "it will be some time before we can appreciate now muca tais Rusia (Yeltsin) man did However, Putin is not just has a «uyPcke Petite Russia powerful "the again - a country thal people and army be proud." He lays emphasis powerlut centralised stale, on patousm ano on He fold the assembled milthey itary at the new year awards in Gudermes that the war; honour and dignity to the country. No. this 1s about more serious things. This is
Outlook about how to bring the end of the break-up of Russia. nat is your fundamental goal."
not initiator main power The regime had third countries stance rules for the WCAPORA budget.
concerned like neo-liberal?
and thrive, the tor.
crewill have to reversed. requiring sity be ian regime able tance, both passive and the Eurasia, for oil the and the him. The road to capitalist restoration The roots of the Russian crisis are traced sually back to the collapse of Stalinism which followed on the heels Gorbachev's failed attempr, through his policies or glasnost and perestroika.
reform the decayed bureaucratic stagnant command coonomy it had created.
is out since the the 1920s. on which command dominant 0l the ist restoration.
However, democratic ularly after the fall the Berlin the while about the tions of the guard interests Crimea and sought Yeltsin's resignation. Yeltsin War - Money - War rejected their demand and boldly drove down to the on a tank in front of the world's denounced the plotters and declared himself the governenough military of popular support, the coupAfter the failure of the the USSR disintegrated. Trotssy called Soviet "prison house nations", and this analysis was confirmed by the tumulnationalist HOVCHICHS diverse Republics.
Led by the Ukraine, they succeeded one by one. This partial and qualified victory I SECS OT national self-determination was undoubtedly a step forrights, but was not without contradictions. Independence was achieved under right wing nationalist caactsmips, SOCHEESE Oncs Gorbachev was fin. ished too. He was released after the coup, but was then humiliated in the parliament by Yeltsin, who ousted him. The man of tive aid. soon "shock therapy:"
planning fake purthe of launched fail. producing a relatively ВОЙНА 'cherry socialised the 'heroic' days of the On *Black Tuesday', taxes.
it the Chechnya, and increasingly and flagrant. WUlSC.
Wall although There demanding the summer the Continwing Russian politics by other means: Russian troops stand guard in neuly-occupied Chechnya During the elections in 1996 though the International Zyuganor, its current leader, Monetary Fund had who was himself a lower begun payments to Russia first war ranking bureaucrat, made it from one of the largest economic rescue packages in would not threaten business (as the CPRF made clear in Boris Kagarlitsky writes the December, became tions). The CPRF rejects IMF in the Russian Crisis. widespread *Russia has in general foloffers the workers a nation- lowed the instructions of the alist state capitalism and a IMF and other international was one strong state.
Despite Yeltsin's some- IMF has accepted and sup. times eccentric Bonapartist ported economic policies of methods, political rifts and the Russian government, confrontations continued to while the Russian govern• fall The Western media claims principles and advice of the of have understood IMF decision-makers. What the ruthiess power ВОЙНА on the Russia were all about, putting it down to the Lussian character and and articles of faith; the succession hand ВЫБОРЫ-99 nicked Prime Ministers with intentions to implement the IMF только Journal capitalist system, faltered, fumbled and ПОЛИТИКАМ finally These has deterio- failures had profound Only politicians need war!
"These decisions resulted COCHSOHS not due to Yeltsin's clown- in the current chaos which has not only led to the total collapsc of tae Kusstan coon publicly. he big question omy, something unprecehow dented in peace time, but social cointere also is bringing the whole world closer to ... Along with the been date new hegemonic devaluation marked the definitive failure the crash by ruling class, with all its social wages, one of the largest working IMF and major world govclasses in the world, which ernments." (Labour Focus on had made a social revolution and had a standard of living The of oil has increased over the past year. than to the 'Third World? casing the pressure on the In ys the crisis of the Russian economy to some Russian economy reached catastrophic proportions. as far as its underlying probworld market, mainly due to Although the growing crisis of the East which we see today has many of the surface acarance gered in August of that year a and paraphernalia of capitalcatastrophic collapse of the ism, it is without the subamong Toubic and sentral conome of old activity. The crash made it clear to Russia defaulted on its the whole world that debt-repayment to the IME. This in turn contributed to had not only stalled again, but had never Patriotic crisis at that time. The col- got seriously off the ground.
lapse of the debt market in (To be August happened
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