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A victory for Russia?

Anti-Russian hysteria and sinking gas prices: Russia's press questions whether the gas dispute with Ukraine really ended in a victory for Russia.

Since an agreement was reached in the gas dispute between Russia and Ukraine the Kremlin has cast itself as the victor. At the same time Russian President Dmitry Mevedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin are trying to use television appearances to convey the impression that the gas dispute was a purely economic affair. But commentators in Russia are talking openly about the geopolitical aspects, and in particular about President Viktor Yushchenko's efforts towards gaining Nato membership for Ukraine, which were apparently the reason for Moscow's demonstratively taking a hard line on Kiev. Alongside the victory cries in the commentary pieces of serious Russian newspapers there is concern that Russia's reputation has suffered not only in Europe, but also in the countries that are allied with Russia in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS).

Ukraine's unreliability

Konstantin Zatulin, director of the Institute of CIS States and a member of the Duma (the lower house of the Russian parliament) wrote in Russia's leading tabloid Komsomolskaya Pravda - which has very close connections with the Kremlin - that Russia was able to capitalise on the gas dispute, but that "political expenses" had been incurred: "As always, in the West there were attempts to stir up anti-Russian hysteria by claiming that Russia was trying to punish Ukraine for its efforts towards democracy. ... It's difficult to persuade these people otherwise because as proof they play on prejudices that were already formed during the war in Georgia."

Photo: photocase/mbv

However Zatulin adds that not only in the West but also in Russia there are plenty of government critics, particularly when "those in power take resolute and harsh action in the name of national interests."

Yushchenko the loser

Like almost all Russian commentators Zatulin believes that Ukraine has discredited itself "in the eyes of Europe" as an "unreliable and corrupt gas transit country". For the Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko, who has been widely disparaged as a US vassal by the Moscow press since Ukraine supplied weapons to Georgia, the gas dispute was a "personal defeat". The Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, on the other hand, had "naturally won". The Moscow press has gone easy on Tymoshenko since she adopted a moderate stance on Russia with an eye to winning the votes of Ukraine's Russian-speaking minority. Back in early 2005, a while after the Orange Revolution, she was still resolutely anti-Russian. The Kremlin is thus effectively strengthening Tymoshenko's position against President Yushchenko.

In a commentary for the west-oriented Moscow Times Kremlin critic Julia Latynina joked that Gazprom would be able to "write off" the financial losses incurred during the gas war as funding for Tymoshenko in the campaign for Ukraine's 2009 presidential elections. The Ukrainian Prime Minister Tymoshenko was "the clear winner" of the conflict, Latynina wrote, while the "biggest loser was the Ukrainian President [Viktor] Yushchenko." "The Kremlin is also a loser, but it compensated for its losses by successfully exploiting Yushchenko's incompetence when it came to settling the gas dispute."

The next conflict over gas transport prices

Vladimir Milov, who as one of the last reformers of the Yeltsin era was deputy energy minister in 2002 and is now an active member of the newly founded opposition movement Solidarnost along with former world chess champion Garry Kasparov, expresses doubts about Russia's euphoria over a victory in the Russian gas conflict in a commentary for the Kremlin-critical Novaya Gazeta. According to him not only has Russia's image been seriously damaged, but in the new contract brokered between Gazprom and Naftogaz Ukraine was also able to persuade Russia to couple gas prices to oil prices, an arrangement which "is very advantageous for Ukraine in the short term." The question now, Milov writes, is "whether this result makes it worthwhile for Gazprom to have cut off gas supplies to Europe for two weeks." However he does not answer this rhetorical question. Instead the ex-minister predicts that the next conflict between Moscow and Kiev will develop over the question of the transit price, or in other words the price that Ukraine can charge for transporting Russian gas through its pipelines. Under the new contract, from 2010 that price will be based on the "European transit price". But according to the ex-minister there is no such thing as a European transit price.

Looking to the West

One clear success for the Ukrainian prime minister, as Milov points out, is that in future Gazprom will sell its gas supplies for Ukraine to Naftogaz directly. This means that the dubious intermediary company RosUkrEnergo, which has its headquarters in Switzerland and whose services both Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Ukrainian President Viktor Yuschenko wanted to retain, no longer comes into play. "The lack of direct relations between Russia and Ukraine led to problems" Milov writes, "Gazprom was unable to collect its earnings directly and had no means of making Naftogaz fulfil its obligations."

The national-conservative Nezavisimaya Gazeta paper points to another problem that has developed as a result of the recurring "gas wars": Russia's influence in the CIS is continually dwindling. "Even Russia's closest ally - Belarus - has spoken openly about its Europe-oriented foreign policy and prospects, although until recently the subject of the West was, to put it mildly, not part of the Minsk tradition." Belarus had "made a clear decision to commence new relations with the EU. ... The countries of the Community [CIS] are changing their orientation. The gas war accelearated this process on their territories, particularly the last one." Moscow is always talking about the importance of integration into the CIS, the newspaper writes, but basically has nothing to offer "to make integration into the Community attractive".

Ulrich Heyden

Ulrich Heyden comes from Hamburg and has worked as a correspondent in Moscow since 1992. He writes for the "Sächsische Zeitung", "Rheinischer Merkur" and "Freitag". ...
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