Word: putin
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...RUSSIA Personal Choices President Vladimir Putin put his stamp on Russia's government with significant changes to the Cabinet that he inherited a year ago from Boris Yeltsin. Out went Defense Minister Igor Sergeyev, to be replaced by Putin's closest confidant, Sergey Ivanov. Duma Deputy Boris Gryzlov, who in his first year in high politics has become best known for unquestioning devotion to the President, took over the Interior Ministry from Vladimir Rushailo. And the Defense Ministry acquired its first female deputy minister, financial specialist Lyubov Kudelina...
...news about Vladimir Putin's first year in power is that he has shown a consistent desire to curb independent media. The more reassuring news is that he is making a hash of it ? so far, at least. Over the past year the full force of the Russian state has been concentrated on Media-Most, the owner of NTV, the one independent TV station with a near-nationwide reach. It has been raided dozens of times, founder Vladimir Gusinsky is in Spain fighting extradition and other executives have fled the country. Judges have consistently ruled against NTV ? or quickly changed...
...described as having a questionable past, and the speaker of the lower house of the Duma even referred to them as "sort of swindlers." To make matters worse, the Communist Party, which hates NTV, has now swung round to support it against the takeover, because one of the men Putin has put in charge is an American, Boris Jordan. It's like he was trying to see how many toes he could tread on simultaneously. The Kremlin has alienated a number of different constituencies in one, not very fell swoop...
...Putin's attempted putsch has failed, at least for now. But the network's prospects still look pretty grim. After all, how much does Putin have to fear from a demonstration in Moscow...
...This standoff, and the planned demonstration, is a problem for Putin, although not a big one. It's not going to shake his grip on Russian public opinion, but he's in a no-win situation. If he uses strong-arm tactics to close the network down, that will create a messy political situation. But if he doesn't, he'll look like he's unable to follow through on his threats. Of course Putin's modus operandi is to deny any knowledge that these things are even going on, but in reality the NTV standoff presents him with...