Word: duma
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...hyperbolic, but such open opposition to the government is extremely rare in Putin's Russia - and the Kremlin is still jittery after Ukraine's orange revolution, fearing that some of the popular unrest that defeated Moscow's candidate for President might spill across the border. And independent Duma Deputy Vladimir Ryzhkov insists that the danger is real: "These spontaneous protests signal the moral end of Putin's corrupt secret-police regime," he told TIME. In some regions, such as Chelyabinsk in the Urals and Kemerovo in Siberia, authorities caved in and reinstated the transport benefits, if only temporarily. But scores...
...nothing but empty words. And so he reached for a safety blanket of his own last week, announcing a series of moves aimed at consolidating political power in the Kremlin. Under Putin's plan, the 89 regional governors will henceforth be appointed, not elected. Russia's parliament, the Duma, will be elected only from party lists, not from constituencies. As most parties represented in the Duma today are pro-government, this increases even further the Kremlin's sway over the lower house. Putin claims the changes are necessary to strengthen security in the wake of Beslan, but Kremlin watchers...
...decrease the checks on the central government built into the current constitution. And with the national legislature satisfied to remain a pliant tool of the Kremlin, that means more unchecked control for the president. But just to make sure it stays that way, Putin wants every member of the Duma, the lower house of parliament, to be elected using party lists—that is, in the ballot box voters choose a party instead of a particular candidate. This offers obvious advantages to the large, resource-laden pro-Putin parties with widespread name recognition and eliminates the possibility for charismatic...
...Mikhail Delyagin, a former top aide to President Boris Yeltsin, now director of the Institute of Modernization, a Moscow-based think tank. Many oil magnates, officials and analysts believe a Rosneft takeover is the real motive for destroying Yukos. "Sechin's role in this is an open secret," says Duma deputy Alexei Kondaurov, a former KGB general and Yukos executive. Profits and tax revenues from the oil industry fund over half of Russia's federal budget. Yukos accounts for 20% of Russia's oil production, Rosneft for 4.5%. But Sergei Oganesyan, head of the Federal Energy Agency and Rosneft...
...presidential term, the oligarchs and the Kremlin made an informal agreement: if the oligarchs stayed out of politics, the Kremlin would not revisit the dubious privatization deals that brought them their billions. Khodorkovsky chafed under this, and by Putin's second term he was funding opposition parties in the Duma. He claimed this was to encourage a vibrant democracy; the Kremlin suspected him of buying his own political bloc. Khodorkovsky may pay a high price for his political ambitions. "He will not walk the streets of Moscow for the next five years," predicts an international financial specialist. But Russia could...