Diplomats say Dmitry Medvedev, Russia’s neophyte president, is gradually emerging from the dark shadow cast by his predecessor, Vladimir Putin, and becoming his own man.
Medvedev’s international reputation was reinforced at this month’s Moscow summit when United States President Barack Obama described him as a ‘professional†and promised a new start in bilateral relations. His domestic stock is rising, too. His poll ratings soared last year after Russia’s war with Georgia and have remained high despite the economic downturn.
The 43-year-old’s reputation as a next-generation reform technocrat was underscored this week when he unveiled plans to open up regional and national politics to younger Russians, especially under-30s, who comprise more than 25% of the population.
Medvedev had not held public office before his election last year and would probably have remained obscure but for Putin’s endorsement. But speculation that the new man was merely keeping the Kremlin warm pending an inevitable Putin return in 2012 is subsiding.
Insiders now suggest he is acquiring sufficient clout to chart an independent future. But increased exposure brings increased expectation and a host of problems lie between Medvedev and a second term.
One of the most pressing — enforcement of the rule of law — was highlighted last week by the killing of Natalia Estemirova, a courageous human rights critic of Chechnya’s warlord president, Ramzan Kadyrov.
Unlike Putin, Medvedev was quick to condemn the murder. But he was equally quick to absolve Kadyrov of blame. ‘Medvedev has expressed his outrage at Natasha’s [Natalia’s] death but that is not enough,†wrote Tanya Lokshina, of Human Rights Watch in Russia, in the Washington Post.
‘The Russian government must launch an immediate and thorough investigation into not only Natasha’s death but the full range of human rights atrocities that have unfolded under [Kadyrov’s] leadership.†More broadly, the killing refocused attention on Russia’s unruly northern Caucasus region.
Unstable and dangerous though Chechnya is, neighbouring Ingushetia was even worse in 2008 in terms of insurgency-related violence and Dagestan was not far behind.
The context is the feared spread of Islamist militancy from central Asia — a potent challenge to Medvedev’s authority, as with Russian leaders back to the time of the tsars.
US Vice-President Joe Biden’s visits to Ukraine and Georgia this week provide an uncomfortable reminder for Medvedev, meanwhile, that Obama’s feel-good politics, so persuasive up close, conceal sharp edges and red lines.
The US leader wanted nuclear arms cuts and help with Afghanistan — and got both. But he has not jettisoned the Bush administration’s commitment to Nato membership for the two former Soviet republics and is likewise pursuing planned missile defence batteries on Russia’s western borders.
Russia still sees itself as a great power, a perception vigorously promoted by Putin. But the toughest challenge facing Medvedev may be to tailor and trim that inflated self-image to fit a less glamorous reality. Russian weakness, subtly exploited by Obama in Moscow, was the hidden story of the Putin years.
In the Medvedev era developing a lawabiding, economically diversified civil society at home while pursuing more cooperative behaviour abroad may be the path to returning strength and a second term. —