Belarus - Opposition Leader Jailed

After a press conference in Minsk this morning, Belarus opposition leader and former presidential candidate Alyaksandr Milinkevich was arrested by Belarus police. The arrest was due to an "illegal" demonstration in Minsk on Wednesday to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Chernobyl accident.

According to Interfax, "The Pervomaisky district court in Minsk has sentenced former opposition candidate for the Belarussian presidency Alexander Milinkevich to 15 days of administrative arrest for unsanctioned actions during the Chernobyl Shlyakh procession in Minsk on March 26. Milinkevich is to appeal the judgment."

Milinkevich claims that permission for the demonstration had been granted by authorities. He has also been known for trying to restrain his followers on such occasions, in order not to provoke violent action from the police. Wednesday's demonstration thus seems only a pretext for the authorities to put Milinkevich in jail.

Even though the Chernobyl anniversary all the more has turned into an opposition rally during recent years, it is remarkable that Belarus authorities chooses this opportunity to clamp down on Milinkevich. Perhaps, it testifies to the desperation of the Lukashenka government, which was gravely shocked by the extent of public protests after massive fraud in the recent presidential elections.

Chernobyl is a hotter issue in Belarus than might be expected 20 years after the accident. The people of Belarus have never really learnt the full extent of the accident and the government has put a lid on information on its consequences for the country. Basic information on radiation levels is therefore not available and no real official assessments of the health and environmental effects have become public.

This year, such worries have taken a new turn as Lukashenka wants to repopulate those areas of Belarus that in 1986 were evacuated due to high levels of nuclear radiation. The decision to repopulate worries many people, as nobody really knows how contaminated these vast areas still are. To make people move back thus seems as yet another irresponsible and cynical action by Lukashenka. As long as people are barred from knowledge and information, it is like asking "-Would you like to move to Chernobyl?".

Belarus, Milinkevich, arrest, opposition, Chernobyl

The Chernobyl Myth

Exactly 20 years ago to the minute, reactor 4 of the Chernobyl nuclear plant 100 kilometres north of Kiev exploded in a nuclear meltdown that ever since has remained a symbol of the dangers of nuclear energy and the hypocrisy of the soviet system. Today, the consequences of Chernobyl stand out as the apocalyptic disaster it was in terms of the thousands of victims that it hit and the grave effects on the environment it had. Morever, it has become a symbol in the hands of different actors, which for various reasons use Chernobyl as a myth in their own interest or for higher purposes.

The facts
On the evening of 25 April 1986, tests on Chernobyl reactor number 4 were initiated. While doing so, numerous safety procedures were disregarded. This eventually created a chain reaction that by 1:23 AM in the morning of 26 April, made the reactor go out of control. This caused an explosion blowing off the heavy steel and concrete lid of the reactor that led to high radiation levels in the vicinity of Chernobyl. The immediate death toll from the expolosion numbered 30 people. In the days after the nuclear meltdown, evacuation of some 135,000 people in the surrounding 30-kilometre radius were evacutated. During this time, an enormous radioactive cloud spread across Ukraine, Belarus, Russia, and large tracts of Europe. Large quantities of strontium, cesium, and plutionum were spread as radioactive downfall affecting millions of people. The explosion released 30-40 times the radioactivity of the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. To deal with the accident, thousands of workers and military conscripts were brought or forced to the area around the reactor to cover it with debree, concrete or whatever was at hand, in order to limit further radioactive emission.

In November 1986, an enormous concrete construction was molded - the Sarcophagus - over the wrecked reactor number 4. Some 350,000 tonnes of concrete were used to form a construction intended to last for 30 years. Today, the sarcophagus is gradually falling apart with great cracks in its construction. In December 2000, reactor 3 was definitely closed down, whereas the two other remaining reactors had been put out of use earlier. Some 300,000 people have left the most contaminated areas in Ukraine, Russia, and Belarus. At least 200 villages have been permanently evacuated due to high levels of nuclear radiation. The level of thyroid cancer has increased dramatically among those affected by the accident, among which have been some 2,000 children.

In 1970, the town of Pripyat was founded to house the hordes of specialits and their families coming to work on the reactor from all over the Soviet Union. With a population of 47,000 with an average age of 26, this was the town most immediately affected by the accident. Today, Pripyat is an abandoned town. This is but a telling example of how entire communities of people - municipal and rural - were disbanded forever to meet with uncertain futures. What today is called "the zone" remains an enormous unpopulated area - with a few exceptions - that for long will remain uninhabited. These are but some simple and concrete facts about the Chernobyl accident and its effects.

The aftermath
The first news of the accident actually reached a western audience. High radioactive levels were registered at Swedish and Finnish nuclear plants already on 28 April. It quickly became apparent that the radioactivity emanated from somewhere within the Soviet Union. Western media immediately picked up the story and in the following days the Soviet government came under great pressure to reveal what had happened.

The first news to a soviet audience came by way of a short TASS-telegramme on 1 May, declaring that there had been an accident with the Chernobyl reactor. One may assume that the date was chosen to drown the message in the 1 May celebrations. It was not until 14 May that Gorbachev informed the public by way of a television statement:

"Good evening, comrades. All of you know that there has been an incredible misfortune --- the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear plant. It has painfully affected the Soviet people, and shocked the international community. For the first time, we confront the real force of nuclear energy, out of control."

The versions
In a recent report on the Chernobyl consequences, Greenpeace claims that the death toll due to the accident has been grossly underestimated, BBC reports. These claims have been forwarded in response to an October 2005 UN report by the World Health Organization (WHO). Whereas the WHO indicates between 4,000 and 9,000 deaths from cancer due to Chernobyl, Greenpeace estimates that the actual number of such deaths will be 93,000. It is obvious that there are different versions. Why?

The myth

There are many myths associated with Chernobyl, as seems to be the case with most major events of historical significance. One of the most widespread is, of course, due to a biblical reference, according to which Chernobyl was to herald the second coming or whatever biblical believers may conjure. Chornobyl is, apparently, wormwood in Ukrainian, why one might suppose this should be taken as an omen of the end of the world. Thus the book of revelations 8:10-11 says:

"And there fell a great star from heaven, burning as it were a lamp, and it fell upon the third part of the rivers, and upon the fountains of waters. And the name of the star is called Wormwood: and the third part of the waters became wormwood; and many men died of the waters, because they were made bitter."

This is, of course, the extreme version, but it serves the purpose of pointing out how a tragedy such as Chernobyl is used by various actors. Suffice it to say, this example is perhaps sufficient to point to the plethora of causes for which Chernobyl has been used.

The most recent example is actually Mikhail Gorbachev, who in 1986 had just become the new, young and energetic leader of the Soviet Union. In an editorial in Daily Star last week, Gorbachev rationalises the demise of the Soviet Union by pointing to the accident: "Chernobyl's meltdown accelerated that of the Soviet Union." Here, one must pause to consider facts and then the causality. Already in 1979, the Central Committee of the Soviet Communist Party received a report pointing to dangerous deficiencies in the Chernobyl nuclear plant. This might have passed as just another of a flood of reports, were it not for the fact that it was signed by Yuri Andropov, who was to become soviet leader just a few years later. It is a well-known fact that Gorbachev was one of Andropov's protegees. So, people at the very top of soviet leadership were wholly aware of the state of Chernobyl already seven years before the accident. Any argument that soviet leaders did not know, must therefore be discarded. One option might, however, be that Chernobyl was just another of a multitude of such high-level risks that the soviet leaders had to deal with on a daily basis as a fact of political life. This is though not a necessary precondition to deem Chernobyl a major cause of the demise of soviethood. Even former imperial leaders must follow the simple rules of causality: "post hunc, ergo propter hunc."

What Chernobyl became, was the symbol of the state and failure of the soviet system. As such it was an expression that there was something very rotten in the union, and thus served as a contributing factor to soviet demise. The point is, however, that this factor or symbol might have been next to anything properly describing soviet societal crisis. Chernobyl was normality - not anomaly. It was an exponent of the blatant disregard for human life endemic in the soviet system.

What about today then? Is Chernobyl a thing of the past that people simply refer to as an example of recklessness of tantamount proportions? Yes, in some ways it is. Most of the people that use the Chernobyl metaphor probably never have set foot in Eastern Europe, let alone Ukraine or "the zone". Instead, they use it to portray something vaguely ominous to whatever purpose they see fit - for better or for worse. In this way, Chernobyl has become a mighty myth of our age, and who owns a myth may get his message through much more efficiently than millions of dollars. Chernobyl is indeed a mighty metaphor. Reading about Chernobyl one should therefore always ask, who benefits from it: cui bono?

However, this is not the core of the issue. It but serves to illustrate how Chernobyl is used as a utilitarian tool in the hands of whoever may apply it. To the contrary, Chernobyl is intrinsically an ethical and not a utilitarian issue. Why was this allowed to happen? On what values did a society capable of such disregard for human value rest?

Furthermore, Chernobyl is a matter of the value of the individual, in a similar way as the Holocaust. It is not a matter of numbers, even though they have their importance. The heart of the matter is that Chernobyl symbolises the contempt for human dignity and the value of the indvidual that forms the basis of totalitarianism. Therefore, today try to make out a single face among the victims to represent for you this great disaster to mankind. Then, one can start to fathom what Chernobyl really means.

Chernobyl, 20 years, nuclear disaster, Soviet Union

Russia Lifts Ban on NGO to Ban Another NGO

Hardly had protests peaked last week on the law suit brought against the well-known Soldiers' Mothers NGO, before the Federal Registration Office of Russian Ministry of Justice withdrew the suit. As unclarities on the matter still exist, one should however not preclude the possibility that Russia eventually will continue its plans to close down the organisation. At the same time, the matter brought against the Soldiers' Mothers also serves to hide a similar closure of another less well-known but still important NGO - that of Khodorkovsky-founded Open Russia Foundation, Gazeta.ru reports.

Thus, Open Russia's website on April 12 stated that "Moscow City Court [the infamous Basmanny court] has today rejected an appeal by Open Russia interregional NGO against a Basmanny Court ungrounded and illegal injunction to freeze Open Russia's accounts." It is interesting to see how the same - politically directed - court that brought the case against Mikhail Khodorkovsky now continues to clamp down on his efforts for democracy and transparency in Russian society. It is also apparent that as one of Russia's most well-known NGO's is closed down, the other - the Soldiers' Mothers - is dismissed with a warning, thus drawing away attention from the "lesser evil."

This appears to be the real value of president Putin's ambitions to create civil society in Russia. As long as NGO's do not criticise the state or vital interests, they may be accepted. But if they do what NGO's should do - criticise evils of society to create change - they will be closed down.

Finally, one wonders if these manouvres are just tests by Russian authorities to see how far they can go in repressing civil society without too great domestic and international protests. Perhaps, in the long run, the international community will grow tired of and accustomed to Russian repression of civil society, and stop voicing its concerns. Using a Japanese proverb, the principle of Putin's policy seems to be that: "The nail that sticks out must be hit down."

Russia, NGO, Soldiers Mothers, Open Russia Foundation, Basmanny, Khodorkovsky

Russia: Deepening Aids Epidemic

On Friday, BBC reported on Russia's deepening Aids/HIV epidemic. According to the head of the country's anti-Aids programme, "a new wave of sexually-transmitted infections was adding to earlier drug-abuse cases." Only last year, over 30,000 new infections were registered in Russia. This only adds to the tendence of Aids as an increasingly alarming problem to society.

What is worse, is that neither the government nor other parts of society seem to take the problem seriously. Already today, Russian hospitals and healthcare stand helpless in the treatment of HIV/Aids-victims. Resources are simply too scarce, and the development threatens to consume an increasing portion of the national health budget in the future if drastic measures to halt the epidemic are not taken. Already today, there are some 350,000 registered HIV-positive in the country. These figures are, however, grossly underestimated, and some experts claim that there may be over a million HIV-infected in Russia alone.

Despite that these alarming facts for long have been well-known to Russian leaders and doctors, little has been done to halt what must now properly be labelled an epidemic. Instead, politicians seem to turn a blind eye to the problem, blaming the west for exaggerating the problem and by so doing corrupting Russian youth. Earlier this week, the Moscow city duma called on president Putin to ban foreign anti-Aids campaigners from the country.

According to the BBC, the Orthodox Church also claimed that activities of western organisation aimed at "promoting the commercial interests of Western contraceptive manufacturers." Patriarch Alexei even said that they were "sexually and morally corrupting Russian children with beliefs and stereotypes alien to Russian culture and tradition."

What is there else to say than that Russia seems intent not to see to the interests of its own citizens and do something to save the Russian youth before it is too late. In the meantime, an increasing number of Russians get infected with this plague of our times.

Russia, HIV, Aids, epidemic

Russia Uses Energy to Bully its Neighbours

An editorial in Sunday's Washington Post - "Imperialist Gas" - claims that 'Russia doesn't want to "politicize" energy sales. It just wants to use them to bully its neighbors.' Expectations that Russia would restrain itself in its imperial ambitions during the country's 2006 G8 presidency thus seem to have been falsified. Instead, Moscow continues its increasingly aggressive energy policy towards not only its "near abroad" but also European and global markets.

According to the editorial, Alexei Miller, Gazprom chairman, last week threatened EU governments that 'his company will sell its products in other markets unless they give way to its "international ambitions".' The background was reactions against Gazprom plans to buy Britain's largest gas company. Thus, Miller denounced 'supposed Western attempts to "politicize questions of gas supply"' despite the fact that it is now becoming increasingly apparent that Russia is using the "energy weapon" to 'restore Moscow's dominion over neighbours' such as, on the one hand, Russia-defiant Ukraine and Georgia, and on the other hand, Russia-friendly Armenia and Belarus, and in the process affecting energy supplies to EU-countries.

That Putin is serious in projecting Russia's new role as an "energy superpower" also on the European and global markets should now be considered a political fact, not least in view of the consequences of cuts in gas supplies to EU-members in connection to the New Year's Russian-Ukrainian gas crisis. This makes it necessary also to focus on the importance of Russian acquisitions of western energy companies, in addition to focussing on the supply-issue. Would Moscow's influence on the EU energy market involve both supplies and ownership, Europe may become reliant on Russian energy policies across the board, including control of both energy supplies and infrastructure.

This would pose no great problem to Europe, were it not for Moscow's declared amitions to use energy as a political instrument rather than in its more normal role as a profit generator. Nobody would begrudge Russia's gaining profits from a normal energy market, but when it comes to politics, the matter must be considered from a different perspective. Economics is economics - politics is politics. If the Kremlin wants to meddle the two, the West should show greater caution - as indeed with any country displaying similar ambitions.

Since the 1980's, Western governments have put great emphasis on the important principles of free market economy and its separation from interests of state. Today, this has become a key element in international trade and a basis for organisations and arrangements such as the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the Group of Eight (G8) industrialised nations. President Putin's action is therefore testimony to the extent of disregard that Moscow is prepared to show these principles in the safe assertion that Western governments will remain acquiescent to such measures in view of their increasing dependence on Russian energy. That Putin's policy, under normal circumstances, would complicate the Russian G8 presidency and mar Kremlin ambitions to gain membership of the WTO, seems like something Russian leaders turn a blind eye to.

Putin's blatant disregard of the principles of market economy and free trade is also a danger to Russia itself to the same extent as it thretens the stability of the international energy market. There may come a day when gas prices fall or resources falter, and then Putin's policies will be remembered by the West, and Russia possibly be served with the same treatment as the country is treating its neighbours with now. In today's world, a strategy of tit-for-tat is rendered obsolete, and only applied to those that provoke such reactions by their own behaviour. This could potentially be the fate of a Russia that once more may become consumed by crisis due to its own or international economic imbalances. The question is if anyone will care about the Russians then, possibly making them once more the victims of their own state's policies.

What is worst with Russia's current policy is that it testifies to a lingering misperception of the nature of power in our era. Putin is brought up in a tradition where power is an absolute projection of force - in whatever form. The truth of the matter is, however, that modern societies grow and thrive on the basis of relative power - by cooperating and sharing in order to gain the spoils of the greater overall profit this produces. As long as Russia's leaders do neither understand nor implement this logic, there will be room for both misperception and conflicts between Moscow and the West as each party will act according to different paradigms. If Russian behaviour does not change, the country in the end is likely to come out at the wrong end of the stick in its international relations.

Russia, foreign policy, energy, oil, gas, Gazprom, G8, WTO