http://powerpolitics.org Objective analysis of international politics and security Wed, 03 Jan 2007 15:39:33 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Indonesia is in negotiation to purchase 12 attack submarines over the next two decades. Indonesia is considering buying submarines from Russia, South Korea and China under a plan to acquire 12 of them before 2024, the navy said Jan. 25. ”We have received offers from several countries, including Russia. If we can ... http://powerpolitics.org/?p=191 The Moscow Times reports that ecological experts are warning that Transneft's proposed Far East pipeline presents a serious threat to the integrity of Lake Baikal. Some 80 percent of the 50-member commission of ecological experts created to investigate the project voted earlier this week against the Transneft-proposed route because it ran ... http://powerpolitics.org/?p=190 As I've noted before, continuing natural gas shortages from Russian suppliers have caused great fear among the European countries. As these shortages have dragged on, and the risk of geopolitical instability made all the more clear by terrorist attacks on vulnerable energy infrastructure, governments across Europe have given increasing priority ... http://powerpolitics.org/?p=189 It is interesting to note that Russian foreign policy has once again fallen prey to internal factionizalization. Russia's conduct in the dispute resembles the chaotic foreign policy style of the era of former President Boris Yeltsin. In that period, we also never quite knew who was in charge in Moscow; senior ... http://powerpolitics.org/?p=188 The Public Chamber, an independent government body of 126 national elites from the private sector, is set to convene on Sunday for the first time. The purpose of the chamber is to discuss the state of civil society in Russia and devise ways of improving it. Civil society, the nongovernmental ... http://powerpolitics.org/?p=187 Under Gerhard Schroeder, Germany formed a strategic alliance with Moscow over the issues of energy and commerce. Schroeder, who was much more interested than his predecessors in formulating a conception of German interests separate from the United States, was unafraid to collaborate with Russia in opposition to the America when ... http://powerpolitics.org/?p=5 Because of an extreme cold spell in Russia, with temperatures falling below 31 degrees celsius in Moscow alone, Gazprom has been forced to reduce the volume of its natural gas flows to Europe. Italy, Hungary and Serbia all reported drops in natural gas supplies from Russia on Wednesday as Gazprom struggled ... http://powerpolitics.org/?p=10 The Associated Press reports that American Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice offered some implicit criticism to Russia on Wednesday when asked about the future of her political democracy. The actual transcript of the Secretary's remarks is available here; the question came following a speech announcing a new "transformational" posture for ... http://powerpolitics.org/?p=15 Through Political Theory Daily Review I discovered this very interesting essay by British academic John Gray on America's role in the 21st century. More specifically, Gray discusses whether the United States can accurately be considered a contemporary empire and the extent to which its posture toward the rest of the ... http://powerpolitics.org/?p=185 The genre of political drama is home to a number of venerated productions validly considered to be among the 'greats' in the history of filmmaking; from the many superb renditions of Shakespeare's masterly tragedies to the modern television series 'The West Wing', the motion picture has proven to be an ... http://powerpolitics.org/?p=184