#6005
#11
BBC Monitoring
Russian Communist leader: 2001 was year of capitulation to US party of war
Text of report by Russian newspaper Krasnaya Zvezda on 29 December:
subheadings are the newspaper's own
Gennadiy Zyuganov, chairman of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation [CPRF] Central Committee, spent over an hour on the CPRF Internet site talking to visitors to the world wide web. During a live videoconference, anyone who wanted to could not only put questions to the leader of the country's Communists but also immediately see and hear his replies "live" on their monitor screens at home. Here are G. Zyuganov's most noteworthy replies to questions from visitors to the kprf.ru site.
2001 - the Year of Putin's capitulation
The Kremlin is increasingly becoming a St Petersburgers' club. The Duma has been turned into a rubber-stamping shop that puts its stamp on any antipeople law. The Federation Council has become a place of honourable exile, and the entire presidential vertical power structure works in the interests of the oligarchs.
If 2000 was the year of lost opportunities, 2001 was the year of capitulation to the American party of war and to our own oligarchs.
About Putin's rating
Ratings are created by the Kremlin's "PR children". You only have to look at the regional elections. The propresidential Unity party has not obtained mass support in the campaigns that it has taken part in recently.
Dialogue with Putin is unproductive
We have presented the president with our own programmes, projects and specific proposals on issues ranging from the problems of missile technology to support for veterans and children and the preservation of the nation's physical and moral health. He agrees, but acts differently.
For example, [Boris] Yeltsin is awarded a medal for a decade spent destroying the country. [Gennadiy] Burbulis - Yeltsin's main accomplice in the dismemberment of the Soviet Union - is assigned to work in the Federation Council. [Boris] Nemtsov and [Yegor] Gaydar, who have not served a single day in the army, are promoting their version of military reform, which is destroying our armed forces. The last concessions for servicemen, the elderly and children are being cut.
This disparity between words and deeds has now become particularly obvious and intolerable.
What lies behind the smokescreen of the fight against terrorism?
Russia, trailing behind the American party of war, will be expected in the new world order to play the role of supplier of manpower, a sort of special forces for new provocations and military conflicts with the Islamic world and, possibly, for hostility with China. And Russia will, of course, retain the role of raw-materials quarry for the Western economies.
Putin is fulfilling American instructions irreproachably.
The party of power and the opposition
The party of power is not capable of offering the public a coherent ideology. It unites around two values - those of the leadership post and of the moneybag of the budget.
Only the CPRF and the people's patriotic forces have a real programme of bringing the country out of the crisis. Thanks to this, in 2001, 90 per cent of food was produced in the "red belt" [several regions in central Russia with Communist majority]. There the authorities are working for the people, not for their own pockets.
About the Federation Council
It contains almost nobody connected with the regions. The composition of the Federation Council grossly breaches the ethnic and cultural proportions of representation.
I can see that the authorities regard the current Federation Council's main task as pushing through a constitutional amendment increasing the presidential term of office. With its current composition, the Federation Council is incapable of pursuing other goals or objectives.
Who should be named person of the year 2001?
Several key figures can be singled out from the past year. Among the governors, there are [Orel Region governor Yegor] Stroyev and [Tula Region governor Vasiliy] Starodubtsev. Orel Region harvested 2 tonnes of grain per capita - a result that any European country could be proud of. And Starodubtsev raised the most difficult central Russian Region from the depths of ruin.
Among scientists, my nomination for person of the year would be Sergey Glazyev, corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences. With his scientific school, he has prepared a real programme for the socioeconomic regeneration of the country. You will see: This programme will be implemented; when all the current mafia surrounding the regime gives way definitively, our programme will be implemented. This is the only way to save the country.
Among writers, Aleksandr Prokhanov should be named person of the year. His new novel "Mr Geksagen" reveals the essence and subtext of what is currently taking place in the country.
Among newspaper journalists and publishers, the person of the year is undoubtedly Sovetskaya Rossiya editor-in-chief Valentin Chikin. Valentin Vasilyevich [Chikin] has made his publication a genuinely people's newspaper. No mass medium prints so many readers' letters or so much wise analysis. In terms of the level of its international journalism, the newspaper is currently unequalled.
In the international arena the person of the year is undoubtedly Slobodan Milosevic, who has not cracked or caved in, remaining true to his ideals.
As for negative figures, [US President George] Bush and Bin Ladin could be said to symbolize the year. They are both destroyers.
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