Current Digest of the Russian Press, Vol. 77, No. 18-19 – Table of Contents

EXPERT LINDSTAEDT: AFTER BREAKING EASTER TRUCE, PUTIN AGAIN SEEKS TO GAIN TACTICAL ADVANTAGES, MANIPULATE TRUMP WITH NEW PROPOSAL FOR MAY 9

(By Natasha Lindstaedt, Professor, Department of Government, University of Essex. Novaya gazeta Europe, April 30, 2025, https://novayagazeta.eu/articles/2025/04/30/war-games-en. Complete text:) [Russian President] Vladimir Putin has announced a three-day ceasefire in Ukraine to commence on May 8, coinciding with the 80th anniversary of the Soviet Union’s victory in World War II. The Kremlin says that “all hostilities will be suspended” during this period and has made it clear it expects Ukraine to follow suit. Ukraine responded by calling for an immediate month-long ceasefire and questioned Russia’s commitment to lasting peace. In a post on social media, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrei Sibiga wrote: “If Russia truly wants peace, it must cease fire immediately. Why wait [until May 8]?”…

KARPOVICH: RUSSIA IS ONLY SIDE PUSHING FORWARD PEACE; EUROPE, KIEV SEEKING TO SABOTAGE TRUMP’S RAPPROCHEMENT EFFORTS, BUT KREMLIN KEEPS COOL

(By Oleg Karpovich, provost at the [Russian Foreign Ministry’s] Diplomatic Academy. Izvestia, April 30, 2025, p. 3. Complete text:) President Vladimir Putin’s decision to declare a ceasefire on the occasion of Victory Day was a worthy response to the intensified information efforts of our opponents. Realizing the inevitability of the coming defeat, Ukraine and its patrons are trying with all their might to disrupt the emerging warming in Russian-American relations. The old methods of hybrid warfare are locked and loaded…

MUKHIN: WHILE RUSSIAN EXPERTS FEAR UKRAINIANS WILL USE TRUCE FOR ATTACKS, BUILDUP, EUROPEANS DOUBT PEACE PROCESS, RAMP UP WEAPONS FOR KIEV

(By Vladimir Mukhin. Nezavisimaya gazeta, April 30, 2025, p. 1. Condensed text:). .. Russian Presidential Press Secretary Dmitry Peskov used the words “flagrant manipulation” to describe Kiev’s refusal to give a direct response to Vladimir Putin’s announcement of a May 8 – 10 ceasefire. Peskov once again stated that it is important to begin direct negotiations with Ukraine, but Kiev has been silent on this topic, increasing its strikes on Russian territory…

ZELENSKY NIXES PUTIN’S CEASEFIRE PROPOSAL TO MARK VICTORY DAY, SAYS FOREIGN DIGNITARIES AT THE EVENT WON’T BE ‘SAFE’; EXPERT: SOME EASING OF HOSTILITIES IS EXPECTED DESPITE THE REJECTION

(By Roman Romanov, Aleksei Nikolsky and Vladimir Kulagin. Vedomosti, May 9, 2025, https://www.vedomosti.ru/politics/articles/2025/05/05/1108219-kiev-otverg-kratkosrochnoe-peremirie-i-prigrozil-gostyam-parada. Complete text:) Ukraine has rejected the possibility of a short-term ceasefire to mark Victory Day. This is how Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky responded to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s proposal to declare a ceasefire in honor of the 80th anniversary of victory [in World War II] for three days, from midnight Moscow time on May 8 until midnight Moscow time on May 11…

LUKYANOV: WORLD ORDER CREATED AFTER WWII IS CHANGING FAST, BUT TO ENSURE GLOBAL STABILITY WE MUST NOW RETURN TO THE MORAL, IDEOLOGICAL CONSENSUS THAT LAID BASIS FOR WAR’S OUTCOME

(By Fyodor Lukyanov, research professor at the National Research University Higher School of Economics. Rossiiskaya gazeta, May 6, 2025, p. 2. Complete text:) Eighty years is a period of time during which everything in the world changes beyond recognition, and [viewed] from such a historical distance, phenomena turn from real into mythical. This does not diminish the importance of events, but compels a different assessment of their impact on the present. World War II created the political world to which we are accustomed and which we considered essentially immutable. But now it is changing quickly and irreversibly. No, the upheavals of the first half of the past century are not becoming any less important, but their role is not the same today as it was even two decades ago…

MATVIYENKO: WEST’S RUSSOPHOBIC ATTEMPTS TO REWRITE HISTORY AND REHABILITATE NAZISM WILL FAIL AS WORLD BEGINS TO SHIFT FROM THE BIPOLAR YALTA-POTSDAM SYSTEM TO A MULTIPOLAR SYSTEM

(By Kirill Fenin. Izvestia, May 7, 2025, p. 7. Condensed text:) Editors’ Note – In an interview with Izvestia, Federation Council chair Valentina Matviyenko says that the arrival of many world leaders to the ceremonies in Moscow shows the futility of the West’s Russophobic strategy, as well as the failure of [its] policy to isolate our country.. .. Read Izvestia’s exclusive interview with Valentina Matviyenko for more on the significance of the anniversary of the Great Victory, the fight against attempts to rehabilitate Nazism and the preservation of historical memory…

(By Darya Garmonenko. Nezavisimaya gazeta, April 28, 2025, p. 1. Condensed text:) Editors’ Note. – The Lenin Mausoleum will again be obscured by decorations ahead of the Victory Parade on May 9. In late April, Russian Federation Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov typically asks the Russian president not to do this; this year, that appeal has not yet been made. Instead, there has been a resolution from the [RFCP-organized] International Antifascist Forum that the Communists should more actively defend the historical memory of the Soviet era. . . .

The Antifascist Forum was held in Moscow just in time for Lenin’s 155th birthday. It included numerous events, both related to foreign policy and for educating the public. Among other things, the forum’s attendees focused on the domestic political situation in Russia. It was the current situation that was the subject of one of the adopted resolutions recently published in full on the RFCP’s online outlets…

(By Anastasia Lvova and Dmitry Grinkevich. Ekspert, April 15, 2025, https://expert.ru/mnenie/sanktsionnyy-mekhanizm-eto-titanik-no-tramp-khochet-dogovoritsya/. Condensed text:) Editors’ Note. -Visitors to the American Chamber of Commerce (AmCham) Moscow office can see an interesting still life: ears of rye on a table and a book of photos by S. M. Prokudin-Gorsky, “[Photographing] the Russian Empire.” Asked how he should be addressed, AmCham president and CEO Robert Agee jokes that sometimes he is called Boris Yevgenyevich: He has been working in Russia for over 30 years. However, according to Agee, during the first few months after February 2022 [when Russia invaded Ukraine; see Vol. 74, No. 8, pp. 9 – 13 – Trans.], he was not in the mood for jokes. Although AmCham urged US companies to stay calm and maintain their presence in Russia, many left: He puts direct losses that AmCham members sustained as a result of [anti-Russian] sanctions at $100 billion. But the good news is that both sides seem willing to reach a deal. History shows that Russia and the US have been fostering friendly relations ever since the reign of Empress Catherine the Great.

Question. – Let’s go back to 2022. Whereas, for instance, the freezing of Russian assets was generally predicted, few expected the mass exodus of Western companies. Did you anticipate such a scenario in those days?…

(Meduza, May 6, 2025, https://meduza.io/en/feature/2025/05/06/raids-denunciations-and-orthodox-blessings. Complete text:) Editors’ Note. – Of all the far-right groups in Russia, none has attracted more attention lately than Russian Community (Russkaya obshchina in Russian). In just a few years, it’s gone from one of several major ultranationalist groups to the undisputed leader. Its members carry out raids on migrants, file denunciations against anyone who challenges their worldview, and appear to enjoy ties with everyone from security officials to Russian Orthodox Church head Patriarch Kirill [of Moscow and All Rus]. Here’s what we know about wartime Russia’s most visible far-right movement.

On May 4, the St. Petersburg-based outlet Fontanka reported on a deadly fire in an apartment building in Vsevolozhsk, a town in Russia’s Leningrad Province. The fire broke out in a seventh-floor apartment, where the homeowner’s 46-year-old son was present along with two acquaintances: a 24-year-old woman and a 37-year-old man from Armenia. The man died in the fire, and the woman was later found by rescue workers [outside the building] below the apartment windows, severely injured…

([No author indicated]. Kholod, May 6, 2025, https://holod.media/2025/05/06/kadyrov-poprosil-osvobodit-ego-ot-dolzhnosti/. Complete text:) Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov said he was willing to leave his post and asked to “be relieved of it.” He hopes his successor will have “his own initiatives and his own vision.” Kadyrov told this to Chechnya Today.

In a conversation with journalists, Kadyrov noted that he routinely “hears” rumors of his own dismissal. He did not clarify whether he plans to submit a letter of resignation to Vladimir Putin in the near future…

(By Igor Seleznyov. Nezavisimaya gazeta, May 7, 2025, p. 5. Complete text:) The US House of Representatives has voted in favor of the MEGOBARI Act. The bill was approved by 349 representatives – 168 Republicans and 181 Democrats. Forty-two representatives voted against it, while another 42 abstained.

The full title of the bill, known as the MEGOBARI Act, is the “Mobilizing and Enhancing Georgia’s Options for Building Accountability, Resilience and Independence Act.” Its official title is also the “Law to Counter the Influence of the Chinese Communist Party, the Iranian Regime and the Russian Federation in the Nation of Georgia.” Moreover, megobari means “friend” in Georgian…

(By Svetlana Gamova. Nezavisimaya gazeta, April 30, 2025, p. 1. Condensed text:) People are leaving the Republic of Moldova, where 70% of the rural population works in agriculture. It now has only a tenth of the agricultural workers that it had in 1985.. ..

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, which saw boisterous People’s Front demonstrations of up to 200,000 supporters in the center of Chisinau, that movement’s leaders convinced Moldovans that Russia was taking everything away from them…

([No author indicated.] Meduza, May 1, 2025, https://meduza.io/en/feature/2025/05/01/we-can-start-digging. Complete text:) Editors’ Note. – On Wednesday [April 30], the US and Ukraine signed an economic partnership agreement granting the US preferential access to new natural resource extraction projects in Ukraine, including ones focused on aluminum, graphite, oil and natural gas, Bloomberg reports. The agreement, signed at the US Treasury Department on April 30, also provides for the creation of a joint US-Ukrainian investment fund for Ukraine’s reconstruction.

US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, announcing the deal, said that it’s “time for this cruel and senseless war to end.” He added: “This deal sends a clear message to Russia that the [US President Donald] Trump administration is committed to a peace process that has a free, sovereign and prosperous Ukraine at its center in the long term.” Ukrainian Economy Minister Yulia Sviridenko, who signed the agreement on Kiev’s behalf, said the two countries are “creating a fund that will attract global investment into our country.” Here’s what we know about the terms of the deal so far…

(By Anastasia Kostina. Izvestia, May 6, 2025, p. 4. Condensed text:) Experts interviewed by Izvestia believe that Russia could become a mediator in the deescalation between India and Pakistan. . . .

Two weeks have passed since the terrorist attack in the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir, for which New Delhi blames Pakistani terrorists allegedly supported by Islamabad. Meanwhile, tensions between neighboring nuclear powers are increasing. The parties have moved from diplomatic restrictions to checking combat readiness. The state has imposed counterterrorism measures, starting raids in areas where militants and their accomplices may be hiding. Security measures have also been strengthened in tourism-heavy Goa. On April 26, inspections began there in settlements where migrants live…

(By Vadim Trukhachev, political analyst. Izvestia, May 6, 2025, p. 3. Complete text:) The winner of the first round of Romania’s repeat presidential election, held on May 4, was right-wing Euroskeptic George Simion, and he will be accompanied in the runoff by liberal Nicusor Dan. The vote indicated Romanians’ significant dissatisfaction with the policies of the European Union and NATO, including on the issue of arming Ukraine. And now the likelihood of a Euroskeptic coming to power is very high.

Half the world seems to have been following the adventures of independent candidate Calin Georgescu. His calls for dialogue with Russia and an end to arming Ukraine predictably met with rejection from the EU and NATO leadership. In February, he was detained for a few hours, then restricted from leaving the country. And in March, Georgescu was excluded from running in the repeat election…

(By Konstantin Remchukov. Nezavisimaya gazeta, April 28, 2025, p. 1. Complete text:) Every day, Trump and his team stun the world with shocking news. Nobody can ignore this torrent – all you can do is find a way to adapt: Stay away, take cover or play possum, hoping that somehow all these problems do not affect you.

That’s because he wants to turn the “rules-based world order” upside down. There is one basic idea that, like a master key, explains everything the US does these days with respect to everybody else – and it is that, from now on, Washington has no friends and no enemies. Forget about all the traditional classifications. “America First” means that the rest of the world will have to cough up some cash and pay for America’s reindustrialization…