Word: russian
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...natural gas and oil resources - and its neighbors' lack of the same - as a not-so-subtle diplomatic weapon. Last New Year's Eve, amid icy blasts of winter, Russia's state-owned Gazprom turned off the gas on democratizing Ukraine, which has often tacked the other way from Russian President Vladimir Putin and the other former Soviet republics under his thrall. This year, however, the focus is Belarus, the nouvelle Stalinist state run by Alexander Lukashenko, a man who has tried to appear to be Putin's acolyte. On Jan. 1, unless Belarus agrees to pay double what...
...Seven. A crosswalk between Old Leverett and Leverett Towers. What should be a benign trip to experience the glory of Leverett Dining Hall has become an escalating game of Russian roulette. We cower when we cross DeWolfe St., unaided by any white lines painted on the asphalt, and the speeding cars waffle between letting us pass or flooring it. For the sake of our safety, a crosswalk and a "Careful…Bunny Crossing" sign are in order...
...limits on Russian influence were made clear in July 2000 when Kim Jong-il pulled a fast one on Russia's then-rookie President Vladimir Putin. Back then, Kim told Putin - who visited Pyongyang en route to his debut G8 summit in Okinawa - that North Korea would scrap its missile programs if other countries agreed to blast its satellites into orbit for the purposes of "peaceful space exploration." Putin tried to play Kim's statement as a trump card in his case against Washington's plans to develop a national missile defense system. But, the following month, the North Korean...
...stated objective in the six-party talks is to bring North Korea back to the nuclear non-proliferation treaty. Although mindful of the need to keep talking to Pyongyang in search of "options of reaching a compromise solution to the nuclear problem on the Korean peninsula" - to quote the Russian delegation chief, Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Alekseyev - Moscow has publicly chastised its unruly Cold War ally. Last October, the Russian Foreign Ministry referred to North Korean underground nuclear tests as a disregard "of the will of the world community, interested in non-nuclear status of the Korean peninsular...
...Fear of being rendered irrelevant explains Moscow's nervous reaction to the prospect of informal direct U.S.-North Korea talks on the sidelines, as mentioned by U.S. delegation chief Christopher Hill. The Russian Foreign Office leaked comments of its senior official to a Moscow daily to the effect that "We're not going to let the Americans monopolize any contacts outside the six-party talks format." That sounds as resolute as it is ineffective: Unlike the U.S., Russia has neither the stick nor the carrot that could change North Korea's behavior...