This Week’s Highlights 

• Speaking after talks in Vienna on June 23, U.S. Special Presidential Envoy for Arms Control Marshall Billingslea said he and Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov had made enough progress that they agreed to set up "multiple" technical working groups, with a second meeting depending on their progress to replace New START, RFE/RL reports. However, further talks face substantial obstacles, including the U.S. insistence that Russian short-range tactical systems be included in a future accord, according to the Wall Street Journal.
• U.S. President Donald Trump was taken aback when, on March 1, 2018, Russian President Vladimir Putin touted Russia’s development of a new nuclear-capable hypersonic missile using a simulation that depicted an attack on what appeared to be Florida. “That got Trump’s attention,” Fiona Hill said, according to The New Yorker. “Trump was, like, ‘Real countries don’t do that. Why’s he doing that?’”
• Russian ransomware group Evil Corp, whose leaders were indicted by the Justice Department in December, is retaliating against the U.S. government, many of America's largest companies and a major news organization, identifying employees working from home during the pandemic and attempting to get inside their networks with malware intended to cripple their operations, the New York Times reports. Sophisticated new attacks by the hacking group—which the Treasury Department claims has at times worked for Russian intelligence—were identified in recent days by Symantec Corporation, a division of Broadcom.
• French President Emmanuel Macron is confident of progress in key areas with Russia, AFP reports, including notably the crisis in Libya, his office said after a video conference summit with Putin. During the summit, the two leaders called for a ceasefire in Libya and a return to dialogue, according to Reuters. Their video summit, during which Putin and Macron addressed each other as “dear Emmanuel” and “dear Vladimir,” came after Macron this week bitterly attacked Turkey's intervention in the Libya conflict. A French official said that during the Putin invited Macron to Russia this summer and the French president had accepted.
• Russia will accelerate S-400 air defense system deliveries to India by a year following tense standoffs with China and Pakistan in contested border regions, Kommersant reported. India now expects Russia to send the first of five S-400 batteries in 2020 following the Indian defense chief’s visit to Moscow for Russia’s landmark Victory Day parade, according to Kommersant. It was during that visit that the sides agreed that delivery of S-400s, which were originally scheduled for 2021, will be expedited. The Indian military now expects to receive the first S-400s this year.

NB: Next week’s Russia in Review will appear on Wednesday, July 1, instead of Friday, July 3, because of the U.S. Independence Day holiday.

 

I. U.S. and Russian priorities for the bilateral agenda

Nuclear security:

• The use of chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear materials and expertise remained a terrorist threat in 2019, according to the U.S. State Department’s Country Reports on Terrorism 2019. In 2019, Global Initiative to Combat Nuclear Terrorism partner nations hosted eight multilateral activities that raised awareness of the threat of terrorist use of nuclear and radioactive materials and provided opportunities for countries to share information, expertise and best practices, according to the report. (Russia Matters, 06.25.20)
• “The [Trump] administration will continue to work with Congress to finalize plans for U.S. disposition by the alternative [plutonium] dilute-and-dispose method. Further steps are needed in this respect before engaging Russia to obtain its agreement to this alternative method of disposition as required under the PMDA [Plutonium Management and Disposition Agreement],”  according to the State Department’s June 20 report, Adherence to and Compliance With Arms Control. (Russia Matters, 06.25.20)
• Russian nuclear security company Eleron will develop the physical security system of Rooppur nuclear power plant at a cost of $282 million. Eleron inked an agreement recently with the Bangladesh Army and the Nuclear Security and Physical Protection Cell, or NSPPC, to develop the security system. (Energy & Power, June 2020)

North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs:

• No significant developments.

Iran and its nuclear program:

• Iran's U.N. ambassador Majid Ravanchi said June 25 he believes a U.S. resolution to extend an arms embargo against his country will be defeated and warned it would be "a very, very big mistake" if the Trump administration then tries to re-impose U.N. sanctions. Ravanchi spoke a day after U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo threatened to seek to reimpose U.N. sanctions on Iran if the Security Council does not approve a resolution that would indefinitely extend the arms embargo set to expire in October. (VOA, 06.26.20)
  • France, Britain and Germany said last week that they would not support the Trump administration's threats to reimpose the sanctions, but urged Tehran to allow access to two secretive sites where nuclear material may be stockpiled. (The Washington Post, 06.21.20)

New Cold War/saber rattling:

• Russia on June 26 said the new space strategy unveiled by the U.S. this week was "aggressive," accusing Washington of seeing space as a place to wage war. Unveiled by the Pentagon on June 24, the strategy said: "China and Russia present the greatest strategic threat due to their development, testing and deployment of counterspace capabilities," it said, claiming that Moscow and Beijing are developing tools for jamming and cyberattacks that directly threaten U.S. satellites. (The Moscow Times, 06.19.20)
• U.S. President Donald Trump was taken aback when, on March 1, 2018, Russian President Vladimir Putin touted Russia’s development of a new nuclear-capable hypersonic missile using a simulation that depicted an attack on what appeared to be Florida. “That got Trump’s attention,” Fiona Hill, former senior director for European and Russian affairs on the National Security Council, said. “Trump was, like, ‘Real countries don’t do that. Why’s he doing that?’” (The New Yorker, 06.22.20)
• Trump initially saw no reason to take any action in response to the poisoning of the Skripals in the U.K., and was angered when he learned, from Fox News, that he had signed off on a retaliation that involved expelling almost as many suspected Russian spies as had been expelled by the U.K. and Europe combined. “You lied to me,” he told the former White House aide. “You tricked me.” (The New Yorker, 06.22.20)

NATO-Russia relations:

• Russia’s armed services plan no major military events near NATO borders this year, Andrey Vorobyov, acting head of the Russian delegation to Vienna talks on security and arms control, said during the annual OSCE conference on security. Russia's biggest military exercise of 2020 is due to take place in July-September, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said. Shoigu did not disclose either the name or the location of the exercise, but Russian media have earlier reported that Russia’s annual strategic exercise this year will take place in the south and be called Caucasus-2020.  (Interfax, 06.26.20, TASS, 06.26.20, Russia Matters, 06.26.20)

• “Germany owes a lot of money. They don't pay their bills. They're supposed to be paying 2 percent and they're paying 1 percent. If that, and it's not fair. So we're supposed to defend Germany from Russia, right? And yet Germany pays Russia billions of dollars for energy. How does that work?” Trump told The Wall Street Journal. (Wall Street Journal, 06.18.20)
• “We do consider Russia to be a serious threat. Spending 1 percent of your GDP on defense, as Germany does, acknowledges that they may well not take it as serious of a threat as the United States of America takes it. They need to,” Pompeo said. (AP, 06.26.20)
• U.S. Defense Secretary Mark Esper on June 26 sought to reassure allies at NATO that Washington will consult them on any future troop movements, after Trump surprised partners at the military alliance by announcing earlier this month the withdrawal of thousands of personnel from Germany. (AP, 06.26.20)

Missile defense:

• No significant developments.

Arms control:

• Speaking after talks in Vienna on June 23, U.S. Special Presidential Envoy for Arms Control Marshall Billingslea told a news conference that he and Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov had made enough progress that they agreed to set up "multiple" technical working groups, with a second meeting depending on their progress to replace New START. "We, the United States, intend and believe ... that the next arms control agreement must cover all nuclear weapons, not just so-called strategic nuclear weapons," Billingslea said. Ryabkov called the agreement to continue negotiations "a significant step forward." (RFE/RL, 06.23.20)
  • Further talks face substantial obstacles, including the U.S. insistence that Russian short-range tactical systems be included in a future accord. Ryabkov suggested earlier this month that Moscow might consider the demand if it received "something really attractive in exchange." While Ryabkov didn't define what Russia might expect in return, Moscow has long sought constraints on U.S. missile-defense programs and on U.S. long-range conventionally armed missiles that Washington has steadfastly refused to constrain. (Wall Street Journal, 06.22.20)
  • Russia and the U.S. agreed to a meeting of experts on military doctrines and nuclear strategies during the Vienna talks, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said. (TASS, 06.25.20)
  • "China is a no-show," Billingslea tweeted before the June 23 meeting. To drive the point home, Billingslea included a photo showing empty seats with Chinese flags. That drew a tart response from Fu Cong, the head of the arms control department at China's foreign ministry. "What an odd scene! Displaying Chinese National Flags on a negotiating table without China's consent!" he tweeted in response. "Good luck on the extension of New Start! Wonder how LOW you can go?" (Wall Street Journal, 06.22.20)
• “The United States assesses that Russia is not adhering to all of its presidential nuclear initiatives (PNI) commitments. Although Russia has consolidated its Non-Strategic Nuclear Weapons into fewer nuclear weapons storage sites, Russia’s efforts to retain dual-capable non-strategic systems for its ground forces are inconsistent with its PNI pledge to eliminate nuclear warheads for such systems,” according to the State Department’s June 20 report, Adherence to and Compliance With Arms Control. “The United States assesses that Russia has conducted nuclear weapons-related experiments that have created nuclear yield,” according to the report. (Russia Matters, 06.25.20)
  • “Even if Russia is cheating on some agreements, that doesn’t mean they will cheat on all of them, or that it is no longer worth it to retain the ones that are working. Russia has a clear interest in limiting U.S. nuclear forces just as the United States and its allies have an interest in limiting Russian forces,” according to an assessment of the compliance report by Matt Korda and Hans M. Kristensen. (Federation of American Scientists, 06.24.20)
• Russia is prepared to discuss with the United States mutual grievances in compliance with the mechanisms of the Treaty on Open Skies, provided the dialogue is keynoted by mutual respect, the acting chief Russian delegate at the Vienna negotiations on military security and arms control, Andrei Vorobyov, told the OSCE Annual Security Review Conference. (TASS, 06.26.20)
• There are no pre-requisites at the moment for accepting the initiative of 34 countries for upgrading the Vienna document aimed at easing the risk of military conflicts in the OSCE region, Vorobyov said. (TASS, 06.26.20)

Counter-terrorism:

• Russia continued to prioritize counter-terrorism efforts in 2019 and remained a target of international terrorist groups, particularly ISIS, according to the U.S. State Department’s Country Reports on Terrorism 2019. Low-level militant terrorist activity remained a problem in Russia’s North Caucasus region despite increases in counter-terrorism activities and political consolidation efforts, according to the report. (Russia Matters, 06.25.20)

Conflict in Syria:

• Russia has quit a United Nations arrangement that aimed to protect hospitals and humanitarian aid deliveries in Syria from being hit by the warring parties, according to a U.N. note to aid groups seen by Reuters. (Reuters, 06.25.20)

Cyber security:

• Russian ransomware group Evil Corp, whose leaders were indicted by the Justice Department in December, is retaliating against the U.S. government, many of America's largest companies and a major news organization, identifying employees working from home during the pandemic and attempting to get inside their networks with malware intended to cripple their operations. Sophisticated new attacks by the hacking group—which the Treasury Department claims has at times worked for Russian intelligence—were identified in recent days by Symantec Corporation, a division of Broadcom, one of the many firms that monitors corporate and government networks. In an urgent warning issued June 25, the company reported that Russian hackers had exploited the sudden change in American work habits to inject code into corporate networks with a speed and breadth not previously witnessed. (New York Times, 06.26.20)
• New Zealand police said June 22 they have seized $90 million from Alexander Vinnik, a Russian bitcoin fraud suspect who is in French custody but is also wanted in the United States. The U.S. has accused Vinnik of laundering billions of dollars through BTC-e, one of the world's largest digital currency exchanges. (AP, 06.22.20)

Elections interference:

• No significant developments.

Energy exports from CIS:

• Germany is preparing to strike back against the U.S. if Trump follows through on his threat to kill off the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline with additional sanctions. Chancellor Angela Merkel's administration is considering pressing for coordinated European Union action, according to two German officials. New measures proposed by U.S. senators could put Nord Stream 2 in permanent danger, the German officials said. In addition to measures proposed by the Senators, several member of the U.S. House of Representatives filed a House companion bill on June 25, which will impose additional sanctions on Nord Stream II. (Bloomberg, 06.26.20, Forbes, 06.26.20)
• Russia’s exports of its flagship Urals crude oil grade are set to plunge in July, underscoring the nation’s commitment to helping OPEC and allied producers to avert a global glut. Exports of the grade from its three main western ports will fall 40 percent month-on-month to about 785,000 barrels a day in July, according to loading plans seen by Bloomberg. (Bloomberg, 06.25.20)

U.S.-Russian economic ties:

• No significant developments.

U.S.-Russian relations in general:

• Putin is concerned that civil unrest in the U.S. may make Trump and Washington unpredictable in its dealings with Moscow, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said. Peskov said the uncertainty caused by protests fueled by the killing of George Floyd has caused Putin to doubt Washington's commitment to joint agreements, a concern shared in other world capitals. (Newsweek, 06.20.20)
• A lawyer for the former U.S. Marine convicted of espionage in Russia last week says his client will not appeal the decision because he doesn’t trust the country’s judicial system. Interfax quoted Vladimir Zherebenkov as saying on June 23 that Paul Whelan hopes Washington and Moscow will instead agree on an exchange of prisoners. (RFE/RL, 06.23.20)
• A court in Moscow on June 23 upheld U.S. investor Michael Calvey’s house arrest on fraud charges despite the revelation that he has a malignant tumor. Calvey faces embezzlement charges that he says are being used to pressure him in a business dispute. (The Moscow Times, 06.23.20)
• A divided federal appeals court on June 24 ordered the dismissal of the criminal case against Trump's former national security adviser Michael Flynn, turning back efforts by a judge to scrutinize the Justice Department's extraordinary decision to drop the prosecution. The U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia said in a 2-1 ruling that the Justice Department's move to abandon the case against Flynn settles the matter, even though Flynn pleaded guilty as part of special counsel Robert Mueller's Russia investigation to lying to the FBI. (AP, 06.25.20)
• The Clooney Foundation for Justice will be monitoring the high-profile trial of Russian journalist Svetlana Prokopyeva, who is accused of "justifying terrorism." Prokopyeva’s lawyer Tatyana Martynova told RFE/RL on June 22 that the CFJ will be represented at the trial in the northwestern Russian city of Pskov by lawyer Maksim Kuznetsov, who will monitor the trial's legality. (RFE/RL, 06.22.20)
• Sergei Khrushchev, the son of former Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev, has died in the United States, where he had lived for almost three decades. Nikita Khrushchev's great-granddaughter, Nina Khrushcheva, told RFE/RL on June 19 that the former professor died the day before at the age of 84. (RFE/RL, 06.19.20)
• China and Russia continue to rank among the world's worst human trafficking offenders, with both countries routinely exploiting vulnerable populations and doing little to stem the problem, according to the 20th annual edition of its Trafficking in Persons Report published by the U.S. State Department. (The Washington Free Beacon, 06.25.20)

 

II. Russia’s domestic policies

Domestic politics, economy and energy:

• Russia confirmed 6,800 new coronavirus infections June 26, bringing the country’s official number of cases to 620,794. (The Moscow Times, 06.26.20) Here’s a link to RFE/RL’s interactive map of the virus’ spread around the world, including in Russia and the rest of post-Soviet Eurasia. For a comparison of the number and rate of change in new cases in the U.S. and Russia, visit this Russia Matters resource.
• One in five healthy Moscow residents has coronavirus antibodies, suggesting they have been infected and could be immune for a period of time, the Russian capital’s deputy mayor said June 26. City officials say they plan to test 6 million people, or around half of Moscow’s total population, for antibodies. (The Moscow Times, 06.26.20)
• A Soviet-era live polio vaccine is gaining renewed attention from researchers as a possible weapon against the new coronavirus, based in part on research done by Dr. Marina Voroshilova. Voroshilova established that the live polio vaccine had an unexpected benefit that, it turns out, could be relevant to the current pandemic: People who got the vaccine did not become sick with other viral illnesses for a month or so afterward. (New York Times, 06.21.20)
• One in three (37 percent) of Russians would refuse to take a vaccine against coronavirus (COVID-19) even if one were available, according to a survey conducted by Russia’s Higher School of Economics. (bne IntelliNews, 06.24.20)
• Putin on June 20 hailed "hero" doctors who died during the coronavirus epidemic, comparing them to battlefield medics from past wars. On June 25, Alla Samoilova, chief of the state health watchdog Roszdravnadzor, said that 489 Russian medics who tested positive for the coronavirus had died. (AFP, 06.20.20)
• Putin hailed Russia’s progress on fighting the coronavirus pandemic and announced new economic and social support measures. As of Jan. 1 2021, Russians earning more than 5 million rubles ($73,000) a year will pay 15 percent tax on all income above that level, he said. The move will generate 60 billion rubles ($875 million) in extra revenue for the government, Putin said. Families will receive a 10,000 ruble ($145) payment in July for every child under the age of 16, and another 100 billion rubles ($1.5 billion) will be dished out in government-backed cheap business loans for companies to pay employees, he said. Russian IT companies will benefit from a new ultra-low tax regime, Putin announced, with a so-called “tax maneuver” to cut social security obligations on technology firms from 14 percent to 7.6 percent, and slash profits tax from 20 percent to 3 percent. (The Moscow Times, 06.23.20, The Moscow Times, 06.23.20)
• Putin has said he would consider standing for election again if Russian voters approve a controversial constitutional amendment in a vote scheduled for July 1. “I have not made any decisions yet," he said in comments excerpted by Russian news agencies. "I am not ruling out the possibility of running for office if the option appears in the constitution. We’ll see." (RFE/RL, 06.21.20)
• Russia's Central Electoral Commission (CEC) says overall turnout was about 9 percent on the first day of a weeklong vote for constitutional amendments that could pave the way for an extension of Putin’s rule by 12 years. The CEC said that just over 10 million voters cast ballots on June 25, including remote online voting—a first-day turnout representing 9.2 percent of all registered voters. (RFE/RL, 06.26.20)
• Russian health workers treating coronavirus patients across the country say they are being pressured by their superiors to vote on constitutional amendments that would allow Putin to stay in power through 2036. (The Moscow Times, 06.23.20)
• Putin paid homage to Russia's World War II dead on June 22 as he visited an enormous new Orthodox cathedral built to honor the military. (The Moscow Times, 06.22.20)
• Putin’s close associates are the biggest beneficiaries of the country’s 2 trillion ruble ($28.7 billion) waste disposal reforms, according to an analysis of contracts by Russia’s Important Stories investigative website published June 25. Companies linked to close Putin associates Sergei Chemezov, Arkady Rotenberg and Yury Kovalchuk, as well as former prosecutor general Igor Chaika, have reportedly cornered one-quarter of the market. (The Moscow Times, 06.19.20)
• Oil and gas are Russia's main exports, and the Russian budget needs crude prices to be above $42.50 per barrel to break even. Urals crude for August delivery is currently trading around $40, down from $57 at the beginning of the year, though well above the low of $22.7 that it hit amid the global glut in late April. (Wall Street Journal, 06.20.20)
• Russia's central bank slashed its benchmark interest rate to a post-Soviet low as the economy enters a deep recession fueled by the fall in oil prices and the coronavirus pandemic. The bank lowered its key rate by 1 percentage point to 4.5 percent, following a 0.5 percentage point cut in April. (Wall Street Journal, 06.19.20)
• One of Europe’s largest low-cost carriers Wizz Air said it plans to open its first base in Russia with five European routes from St. Petersburg’s Pulkovo Airport starting this September. (The Moscow Times, 06.22.20)
• A northeastern Siberian town is likely to have set a record for the highest temperature documented in the Arctic Circle, with a reading of 100.4 degrees (38 Celsius) recorded June 20 in Verkhoyansk, north of the Arctic Circle. (The Washington Post, 06.23.20)
• A Moscow court has handed a suspended sentence to prominent theater director Kirill Serebrennikov, a surprise legal victory in the fraud case that his supporters say was politically motivated and a test of artistic freedom in Russia. Moscow’s Meshchansky district court found Serebrennikov guilty of large-scale embezzlement on June 26, ordering him to undergo three years of probation and pay an 800,000 ruble ($11,500) fine. Prosecutors had requested six years for Serebrennikov. (The Moscow Times, 06.26.20)
• Two Russian activists from a group known as Set (Network) have received lengthy prison terms on charges of being members of a terrorist group that planned to overthrow the country's authorities. (RFE/RL, 06.22.20)
• A self-described Siberian shaman critical of Putin is a political prisoner being persecuted for his beliefs, the Memorial human rights organization said June 25. (The Moscow Times, 06.26.20)
• A court in southwestern Russia has granted early release to a Danish member of the Jehovah's Witnesses who had been imprisoned since 2017, the religious denomination says. It said a judge in the Lgovskiy District Court on June 23 released Dennis Christensen from prison, three years into a six-year sentence. (RFE/RL,06.23.20)

Defense and aerospace:

• Columns of tanks and troops paraded through Moscow on June 24 as Putin presided over grand World War II commemorations to stir up patriotic fervor ahead of a vote on extending his rule. Putin was flanked on Red Square by elderly war veterans in uniforms laden with medals as thousands of troops carrying bright banners and Kalashnikov rifles marched in the blazing sun to mark the Soviet Union's defeat of Nazi Germany. (The Moscow Times, 06.24.20)

Security, law-enforcement and justice:

• Another Russian scientist has been sentenced to a lengthy prison term on a high treason charge in an ongoing spate of similar secretive cases targeting Russian academics. The Moscow Regional Court on June 22 sentenced Roman Kovalyov, a former senior official at the Central Research Institute of Machine Building, to seven years in prison. (RFE/RL, 06.22.20)
• A police chief in Russia's western region of Kursk has been arrested on suspicion of spying for Ukraine. The Lefortovo District Court in Moscow said on June 22 that Dmitry Borzenkov, the police chief in the Zolotukha district in Kursk, was placed in pretrial detention over the weekend and will be held until Aug. 18. (RFE/RL, 06.22.20)

 

III. Russia’s relations with other countries

Russia’s general foreign policy and relations with “far abroad” countries:

• French President Emmanuel Macron is confident of progress in key areas with Russia, including notably the crisis in Libya, his office said June 26 after a video conference summit with Putin. The two leaders called for a ceasefire in Libya and a return to dialogue. Their video summit, during which Putin and Macron addressed each other as “dear Emmanuel” and “dear Vladimir” came after Macron this week bitterly attacked Turkey's intervention in the Libya conflict, which has tipped the balance away from rebel strongman Khalifa Haftar, whom Russia backs and France is suspected of favoring. "And I'll take you back to my statement last year on NATO being brain dead. I think this is the best example of it,” Macron said in reference to an incident last week when France accused Turkey of harassing a French ship off the coast of Libya. The French official said that during two hours of talks, Putin had also invited Macron to Russia and the French president had accepted. The visit would likely take place "in the next months" and "before the end of the year,” the official said. (AFP, 06.26.20, Reuters, 06.26.20, Euronews, 06.23.20, MKRU, 06.26.20)
• Mercenaries connected to the Russian government have joined forces with a rebel militia to hold Libya’s largest oil field, European and Libyan officials said. A convoy of vehicles carrying Russian and Sudanese mercenaries moved into the 300,000-barrels-a-day Sharara field late June 25 and joined forces with a militia loyal to Haftar, the officials said. The field is operated by Spain’s Repsol SA on behalf of Libya’s state-run National Oil Corp., with France’s Total SA, Norway’s Equinor AS A and Austria’s OMV AG owning minority stakes. (Wall Street Journal, 06.26.20)
• Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov says Russia's approval would be required for any solution reached in peace talks between Kosovo and Serbia, whose leaders are scheduled to meet in the White House this week. Speaking in Belgrade on June 18, Lavrov said the Kremlin would only support solutions to the Kosovo question acceptable to Belgrade and approved by the U.N. Security Council. Richard Grenell, the U.S. special envoy for Serbia and Kosovo negotiations, last week said he had received commitments from both countries to meet in Washington on June 27 for talks aimed at leading to a normalization of relations. (RFE/RL, 06.19.20)
• Putin has attacked European leaders for failing to understand the “real lessons” of World War II and said the U.N. system is the only way for the world’s nuclear powers to avoid direct military confrontation. In an essay published June 25 in The National Interest, Putin blames the Western powers for appeasing Nazi Germany and signing the Munich Agreement in 1938, and attacks Europe—Poland in particular—for wanting “to sweep the ‘Munich Betrayal’ under the carpet.” (The Moscow Times, 06.18.20)
• The EU is considering barring Russian travelers from entering when it reopens its borders next week, The New York Times reported June 23. American and Brazilian visitors could also face the EU ban over the countries’ failures to control their COVID-19 outbreaks. The U.S., Brazil and Russia have the world’s highest COVID-19 caseloads with more than 4.1 million infections combined. (The Moscow Times, 06.24.20)

China-Russia: Allied or Aligned?

• Russia will accelerate S-400 air defense system deliveries to India by a year following tense standoffs with China and Pakistan in contested border regions, Kommersant reported June 26. India now expects Russia to send the first of five S-400 batteries in 2020 following the Indian defense chief’s visit to Moscow for Russia’s landmark Victory Day parade, according to Kommersant. It was during that visit that the sides agreed that delivery of S-400s, which were originally scheduled for 2021, will be expedited. The Indian military now expects to receive the first S-400s this year. (The Moscow Times, 06.26.20, Russia Matters, 06.26.20)
• While China-Russia trade fell 4.3 percent to $41 billion in the first five months of the year, as part of the global economic slowdown, Russia displaced Saudi Arabia as China's biggest oil supplier. (Wall Street Journal, 06.20.20)
• The Chinese Embassy in Moscow has issued a warning after some of its citizens forged negative coronavirus test results to fly back home from Russia. Russia temporarily banned Chinese nationals from entry in February in an effort to prevent the COVID-19 outbreak which originated in China from spreading. As Russia's caseload surged in April, China tightened security at its border with Russia to prevent a second coronavirus wave from being imported. (The Moscow Times, 06.24.20)
• "The Russian coronavirus situation is a huge mess, much worse than we had expected," said Cheng Xiaohe, an international-affairs scholar at Renmin University in Beijing. (Wall Street Journal, 06.22.20)

Ukraine:

• Putin has revealed that in 2014, then-U.S. President Barack Obama allegedly promised to limit the damage to U.S.-Russian relations if the Kremlin didn’t advance beyond Crimea, according to John Bolton’s book. (Carnegie Moscow Center, 06.25.20) 
• The Kremlin has denied it has any territorial claims on former Soviet republics after Putin appeared to question the redrawn borders of Russia after the breakup of the Soviet Union. In a documentary, which aired on June 21, Putin did not say exactly which of 14 republics other than the Russian Federation "took" what he called "Russia's traditionally historic territories," stressing that "when the Soviet Union was created, the right to quit the Union was written in the agreement, but the procedure was not outlined." (RFE/RL, 06.22.20)
• Half of Ukrainians (50.1 percent) do not regret the collapse of the USSR, but every third (33.5 percent) does, according to a poll conducted by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology at the end of May. Almost 60 percent of Ukrainians call themselves Europeans, according to a survey held by the Active Group sociological company. (Interfax, 06.22.20, Interfax, 06.22.20)
• Nearly 150,000 residents of separatist-controlled eastern Ukraine with Russian passports will join Russians in voting on a set of constitutional reforms that would allow Putin to extend his rule. (The Moscow Times, 06.24.20)
• In 2018, Trump and Fiona Hill were aligned on certain issues. Both were wary of the proposal, first raised in the Obama administration and backed by foreign-policy hawks, to supply Ukraine with Javelin missiles. In the end, the Pentagon, worried about an escalating conflict, settled on sending Ukraine just a handful of the weapons, on the condition that they be stored in Yavoriv, a town about as far as possible from eastern Ukraine, where the fighting was taking place. As Hill had hoped, Putin did not retaliate in response to what he understood to be a symbolic gesture of support for Ukraine. (The New Yorker, 06.22.20)
• In early 2019, Hill learned that Ukrainian President, Petro Poroshenko, who was worried that Volodymyr Zelenskiy was surging in the presidential election polls, was passing messages to American officials, asking what it would take to get Trump’s support in the Ukrainian election. (The New Yorker, 06.22.20)
• Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba and his Hungarian counterpart, Peter Szijjarto, met in Kyiv on June 25 as they chaired a session of the Ukrainian-Hungarian Economic Cooperation Commission. After the talks, Kuleba said that officials from both countries will meet to discuss Ukraine's controversial language law before a summit between Zelenskiy and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban can take place in Kyiv in July as scheduled. (RFE/RL, 06.25.20)
• Concerns over Zelenskiy's relations with Russia were recently raised when it was revealed that Viktor Medvechuk, one of the leaders of the pro-Russian Opposition bloc and a personal friend of Putin, owns a blocking share in the 1+1 network. (bne IntelliNews, 06.25.20)
• Prior to his arrest in November 2019, ISIS commander and Georgian citizen Tsezar Tokhosashvili, aka Al Bara Shishani, had been coordinating ISIS activities from Ukraine after entering it in 2018, according to the U.S. State Department’s Country Reports on Terrorism 2019. (Russia Matters, 06.25.20)
• Ukraine’s industrial production declined by 11.7 percent in May year on year, less than April’s record year on year drop of 16.2 percent, according to the Ukrainian State Statistics Service. (bne IntelliNews, 06.24.20)
• Foreign holdings of Ukrainian government hryvnia bonds have decreased by 15 percent since the start of this year, to the equivalent of $3.75 billion, reports the National Bank of Ukraine. Last year, foreign holdings increased 18-fold, to $4.3 billion on Dec. 31. (Ukraine Business News, 06.22.20)
• Ukraine’s oil company Ukrtatnafta, which is controlled by oligarch Ihor Kolomoisky, has won a tender to supply the Ministry of Defense with 3,500 tons of aviation fuel despite asking a price that was 30 percent more than the lowest bid. (bne IntelliNews, 06.25.20)

Russia's other post-Soviet neighbors:

• Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko on June 25 accused Russia and Poland of interfering in the upcoming presidential election, claims that were quickly denied by the Kremlin. The interference is coming from "those who live in Poland and those who incite from Russia," Lukashenko said at a meeting with newly appointed government officials. Several of his critics, including former banker Viktor Babaryko, seen as Lukashenko's leading election rival, have been jailed in the run-up to the vote. Babaryko was CEO of Belgazprombank for 20 years, the country’s largest private bank, which is owned by the Russian gas giant Gazprom. (AFP, 06.19.20, AFP, 06.25.20, bne IntelliNews,06.22.20)
  • “The middle class, his own children, are turning on him,” said a European diplomat of Lukashenko. (Financial Times, 06.23.20)
• A Kyrgyz court has sentenced former President Almazbek Atambaev to 11 years and two months in prison for the illegal release of notorious crime boss Aziz Batukaev in 2013. (RFE/RL, 06.23.20)
• Kyrgyz President Sooronbay Zheenbekov pulled out of attending Russia’s Victory Day parade after two members of his delegation tested positive for coronavirus upon arriving in Moscow, his press service said June 24. (The Moscow Times, 06.24.20)
• Police have detained two men who staged separate pickets outside the Chinese Embassy in Kazakhstan's capital, Nur-Sultan, demanding the release of relatives being held in custody in China's northwestern Xinjiang region. (RFE/RL, 06.26.20)
• The Armenian parliament has adopted proposed changes to the constitution that would lead to the removal of Constitutional Court judges, potentially opening the door for Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian to exert more influence over the South Caucasian nation. (RFE/RL, 06.22.20)

 

IV. Quoteworthy

• No significant developments.