home > by region > europe/russia > central/eastern europe > belarus > Russia: Gassing the Neighbors
Email
| Prepared by: | Lionel Beehner |
|---|
A gas compressor station in Belarus looms as Russia warns the country against siphoning gas from the pipeline. (AP/Sergei Grits)
At two minutes before midnight on New Year’s Eve, Belarus and Russia struck a deal (Bloomberg), narrowly averting an energy crisis similar to last January’s row with Ukraine that temporarily severed gas supplies to Western Europe. The standoff, which resulted in a doubling in the price of Belarus’ gas, reinforces Russia’s role as the continent’s main supplier of energy and underscores the geopolitical consequences (WashPost) of Europe’s growing dependency. Officials at Gazprom, the state-run Russian gas monopoly, swear their motivations are purely commercial, not political. But many analysts, as well as this CFR Task Force, suspect a Kremlin emboldened by soaring gas prices of using Gazprom as a political tool. As a New York Times editorial puts it, the West “remains vulnerable to President Vladimir Putin’s whims.”
Thus, energy security remains foremost on the minds of EU diplomats, as Germany assumes the reins of both the European Union and Group of Eight (G8). “We have to create a clear understanding in Moscow that this is not a zero-sum game,” Klaus Scharioth, Germany’s U.S. ambassador, tells CFR.org’s Robert McMahon. Energy security also topped the agenda during Russia’s G8 presidency last year, but nothing of substance emerged and EU-Russian relations, at least on energy issues, remain largely frozen. Russia continues to supply Western Europe with a quarter of its gas, while Europe remains Gazprom’s biggest customer. But Russia’s heavy-handedness in sorting out energy disputes with its neighbors, as this new Backgrounder explains, has caused some EU officials to question Russia’s reliability as an energy provider and to seek alternative supplies. Moscow’s recent grab of a majority stake in Sakhalin II (FT), Russia’s largest foreign investment project, did little to allay these concerns.
Experts say Russia’s economic growth, fueled by rising oil prices, will only make Moscow more assertive down the road. But Fiona Hill of the Brookings Institution reckons that Russia will be “a different kind of power (PDF) in the twenty-first century from what it was in the twentieth,” relying more on soft power than the hard power that led it “to invade, conquer, and colonize territory in the past.” That is, while military conflicts may be a thing of the past, economic disputes will likely become more frequent. Dmitri Trenin of the Carnegie Moscow Center agrees that Russia’s energy windfall may soften its stance on the political rifts it has had with Europe and the United States (NATO expansion, “color” revolutions, etc.). “To the extent that the Russian ruling elite cares about the West, it cares about economics, particularly the markets for oil and gas,” he writes in Foreign Affairs.
Weigh in on this issue by emailing CFR.org.
CFR offers a variety of email newsletters about up-to-date CFR.org material on what’s happening around the world.
Enter your email address and click 'Go' to subscribe.
CFR Experts are based in CFR’s New York and Washington offices. Each expert's bio page contains his or her contact information, professional and educational history, links to publications and current research, a downloadable one-page biographical narrative, and a high-definition photo.
Identifying international threats and acting on them may be the most difficult job for U.S. policymakers. This report
provides an actionable road map for managing international threats before they erupt into crises and makes a strong case that preventive action is not a luxury but a necessity.
For more than a decade, the United States has mostly watched from the sidelines as Asian countries organize themselves into an alphabet soup of new multilateral groups. In this report, the authors review the relationship between pan-Asian and trans-Pacific institutions and suggest policy guidelines for a new U.S. approach to this new Asian landscape.
Complete list of Council Special Reports
Start-Up Nation addresses the trillion-dollar question: How is it that Israel—a country of 7.1 million, only sixty years old, surrounded by enemies— produces more start-up companies than large, peaceful, and stable nations like Japan, China, India, Korea, Canada, and the UK? With the insights of geopolitical experts and investors, the authors examine this nation’s adversity-driven culture to answer this question and offer prescriptions for a global economy on the rebound.
In Forces of Fortune, Vali Nasr presents a paradigm-changing revelation that will transform the understanding of the Muslim world at large. He reveals that there is a vital but unseen rising force in the Islamic world—a new business-minded middle class—that is building a vibrant new Muslim world economy and that holds the key to winning the cold war against Iran and extremists.
In Cuba: What Everyone Needs to Know, Julia E. Sweig presents a remarkably accessible portrait of Cuba's unique place on the world stage over the past fifty years, including its internal politics, its often fraught relationship with the United States, and its shifting relationship with the global community.
Complete list of CFR Books
Copyright 2009 by the Council on Foreign Relations. All Rights Reserved.
Global Economy 