Moscow, Russia
By Yonatan Pomrenze, NBC News Producer
MOSCOW – Russia inaugurated a new president today. And while there was never really any doubt or drama in the March presidential elections here – Dmitry Medvedev was assured of victory the moment Vladimir Putin announced him as his chosen successor – it is still a mystery what exactly this inauguration will mean for Russia.
Since the elections, Russian media and chat rooms have been trying to guess what the power balance will look like after Medvedev takes over the presidency and Putin becomes prime minister – which is expected as early as Thursday.
The question is: who will really be in charge? Can a "tandem-ocracy," with two leaders at the head, actually work – or will there be power struggles between the two? Media reports say Putin may have as many as 11 deputy prime ministers. The president is the stronger post on paper, but can Medvedev compete with the political capital that Putin enjoys?
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By Jim Maceda, NBC News Correspondent
MOSCOW – The Russian elections are over, all the votes have been counted, and the results will be officially certified on Thursday. We all know that Vladimir Putin's former chief of staff – Deputy Prime Minister Dimitry Medvedev – won.
In December, at the start of the campaign, the Kremlin reportedly sent out notice to all the regional governors on its payroll that it wanted to see a 70/70 result: 70 percent turnout and 70 percent support for the bureaucrat who Putin hand-picked to succeed him. And the Kremlin got what it demanded – almost to the vote. Medvedev's total count was 70.24 percent on 69.65 percent turnout.
Andreas Gross, the spokesman for the only group of Western observers who dared venture into this electoral experiment Putin calls "managed democracy," said at a press conference that the election was "not free, not fair, but accurate all the same."
That's a diplomatic way of saying, remove all the free TV coverage, the biased reporting, the state broadcast media’s ability to create rock stars from rocks, the pressure on employees and students to vote the "right way," the discounted food, the lotteries, the prize money, and the crackdown on all real, anti-Kremlin opposition – and the numbers would still add up to produce a Medvedev victory. There was no need to massage them.
That tells you a few things: how popular Putin is with his people and how disinterested Russians are with politics in general and democracy in particular.
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By Jim Maceda, NBC News Correspondent
MOSCOW – A generation ago, Checkpoint Charlie in Berlin defined the no-go zone between East and West. If you listen to Russian officials these days, that geopolitical schism
has now shifted to the Serbia-Kosovo border.
On one side, Russia defends its nationalist proxy, Orthodox Serbians, who say they will never accept a non-Serbian Kosovo; on the other side, Kosovars – more than 90 percent of whom are Albanian Muslims – are backed in their desire for independence by the United States and most of Western Europe.
Russian warning
This new East-West gap should surprise no one who's watched and listened to Russia's take on Kosovo since June 1999.
Then, just as Serb forces were involuntarily withdrawing from Kosovo, Russian President Boris Yeltsin ordered his general to take his troops – part of an international peacekeeping mission – and occupy the strategic airport in Pristina before NATO could get there.
Those Russian troops eventually re-joined the peacekeeping operation, but only after days of intense negotiations in Finland between U.S. and Russian officials. Most Serbs believed that Yeltsin had abandoned Serbia by acquiescing to NATO’s demands.
For years, every time rumors of an Albanian declaration of independence for Kosovo were whispered in Pristina or Brussels or Washington, Moscow would weigh in, warning that such an illegal act could plunge the whole European continent into another spasm of violence. But no one seemed to take notice.
Then Russia started to muscle up: President Vladimir Putin is no Yeltsin, and Russia under Putin has grown into an economic powerhouse, no longer afraid to throw its weight around. During Thursday’s massive rally against Kosovo independence, Serbian protestors were holding up posters of Putin, showing that they consider the Russian leader to be their chief ally in the current stand-off with the West
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By Yonatan Pomrenze, NBC News Producer
MOSCOW – The phone rang. It was a frantic call from a colleague who works at NTV, one of Russia’s major television stations.
"Is there any way we can watch the ‘Today’ show here in Moscow?" she asked me. "We heard they will be announcing Time magazine’s Person of the Year, and we want to be watching in case they choose President Putin."
I couldn’t help her with the ‘Today’ show, but otherwise she wasn’t disappointed. Time did chose President Vladimir Putin as their Person of the Year, citing as a major factor his efforts to bring Russia "roaring back to the table of world power."
Along with the two other largest television networks in Russia (all three are run by the Kremlin or Kremlin-friendly companies), NTV had a story which would earn Putin even more airtime than the ample amount he usually gets: an American magazine chooses Russia’s president at its Person of the Year, at a time when tensions between the countries are on the rise over disputes about the political direction that Russia is taking.
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By Yonatan Pomrenze, NBC News Producer
The group of men were gathered by the side of the highway and quickly converged on any car or van that came to a stop near them.
A quick discussion of professions (bricklayer, woodworker, etc.) and salary (usually from $40 to $60 for the day) ensued before a few men hopped into the car, considering themselves lucky enough to have found a construction job for the day.
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| Yonatan Pomrenze / NBC News |
| Day laborers wait for jobs on a highway outside of Moscow. |
It was a scene that would look familiar to anyone following the debate over illegal immigration in the United States, but the highway was just outside Moscow and the undocumented workers were mostly from Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.
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By Yonatan Pomrenze, NBC News Producer
It was inevitable. Russia already has McDonald’s, KFC, Pizza Hut, TGI Friday’s and Subway.
So it wasn’t a question whether or not Starbucks would also make it here. It was only a matter of when.
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| NBC News/ Yonatan Pomrenze |
| Employees at Russia’s first Starbucks coffee shop pose before a ribbon-cutting ceremony on opening day. |
And Thursday morning, with little fanfare and a quick ribbon-cutting ceremony, Starbucks opened its first coffee shop in a shopping mall just outside Moscow.
The low-key opening was no surprise. Starbucks may have opted for what company executives called a "soft launch" for their first Russian store in order to test the Russian waters for Starbucks’ potential success.
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By Yonatan Pomrenze, NBC News Producer
What do you get if you combine John Locke from "Lost," the Marlboro Man, and a judo master?
Your first guess may not be Russian President Vladimir Putin, but if these pictures are any guide, it would certainly be the right one. (See video profile).
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| Dmitry Astakhov / AFP - Getty Images |
| Russian President Vladimir Putin fishes on the Khemchik River on Aug. 15. |
Taken earlier this week when Putin took Monaco’s Prince Albert II on a camping trip in southern Russia, they were splashed across the front pages of Russian newspapers and are all posted on the
Kremlin’s website.
They show Putin in various states of ruggedness, feeling at home and at peace with the rivers, the mountains, the horses and fish, and not least of all, his own bare chest.
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By Yonatan Pomrenze, NBC News Producer
Russia’s most popular weapon celebrated its 60th birthday, and it couldn’t come at a better time for Russia’s weapons industry.
At a ceremony in Moscow’s Armed Forces Museum, a first model of the Kalashnikov rifle, the AK-47 (the first version was produced in 1947), was unveiled and placed into the hands of its creator, Mikhail Kalashnikov.
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| NBC News/ Yonatan Pomrenze |
| Mikhail Kalashnikov, inventor of the famed rifle, celebrates 60 years of the weapon dominating armed conflict all over the world. |
The 87-year-old Kalashnikov said he was excited to greet what he called his "first-born," but also said he loves all versions of the Kalashnikov equally – the way a mother loves all her children.
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By Yonatan Pomrenze, NBC News Producer
One of President Bush’s biggest critics came to Moscow on Thursday, and you would have expected him to be welcomed with open arms.
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is here on what has become almost an annual state visit with Russia’s President Vladimir Putin. Economic ties between the two countries have grown considerably – mostly in the form of billions of dollars of weapons sales from Russian to Venezuela.
With the relationship between the U.S. and Russia considered to be at its lowest point in years – missile defense in Europe, democracy development in Russia, and the status of Kosovo being just a few of the issues where the two are at odds – the occasion seemed ripe for Chavez and his harsh criticisms of Washington.
But even though the timing of Chavez’s visit may be perfect for him, it’s a delicate moment for the Kremlin, since Putin is heading to Kennebunkport, Maine, in two days to meet with Bush in an attempt to smooth over some of those differences.
While bringing most of the mainstream media within Russia under its control or influence, the Kremlin usually has little use for foreign media and foreign opinion, and constantly complains that that both are biased against Russia. But in a rare acknowledgement of the importance of both, it looks like the Kremlin has done all it can to tone down Chavez’s impact here.
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By Yonatan Pomrenze, NBC News Producer
As I sit here in Moscow and read about Sanjaya and American Idol, I can’t help but be amused. Here in Europe (yes, Moscow is part of Europe. At least it is for this blog – but more on that later), singing and controversial performances have long ago been elevated to an art form known as the Eurovision Song Contest, which will be held next month.
The Eurovision was first held in 1956 in Switzerland with 14 countries participating and the winner selected by a jury (surprisingly, it was Switzerland). The Eurovision has since become more democratic in voting -- now by viewers calling in and sending text messages -- and the definition of Europe has expanded -- 42 countries will compete this year, including Israel and Georgia.
What’s at stake? The winning country hosts the Eurovision (and the assumed tourism euros) the following year. OK, so it’s not the Olympics. But let’s face it --Andorra, Malta, Albania, and Belarus don’t have a shot at 2016 anyway, so hosting the ESC isn’t such a bad consolation prize.
And despite the fact that few Eurovision winners have gone on to large commercial success (with the notable exception of ABBA’s 1974 victory with "Waterloo"), it doesn’t stop singers from trying to win.
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