International politics
Welcome to Putin’s
Valdai Club
Vladimir Putin, who has spoken to
the participants of all gathering since
its inception, plans t offer a laundry
list of the West’s diplomatic blunders
that brought on the chill
By Chandan Kumar
F
ounded in 2004 with the support of the Russian government
and president Vladimir Putin, the Valdai Discussion Club
bills itself as a forum that “aims to promote dialogue of
Russian and international intellectual elite.” But the club’s
13th annual gathering, held in Sochi in late October, at times felt
more like a shouting match than a measured debate.
The widening divide between Russian and Western values was
on full display at the meeting. Some of the sharpest exchanges
focused on the past, including contentious claims about the
consequences of the Soviet Union’s collapse.
Throughout the conference, Russian speakers criticized the
United States and its Western allies for missing an opportunity
to create a stable geopolitical framework for the 21st century by
failing to embrace Russia after the Soviet collapse in 1991. In the
view of many Russian participants, a stable new pan-European
democratic order could have been created, based on principles of
mutual respect, equal security, and non-interference in internal
affairs.
Hearing the views of Russian officials, it was clear old wounds
have not healed, and there is a deep desire in Moscow to rectify
perceived historical wrongs. Top Russian officials who spoke
at the conference shrouded past slights in aggrieved rhetoric.
Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, for example, condemned NATO’s
membership expansion, claiming that it spoiled any chance for
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The Dayafter November 16-30, 2016
the “establishment of the united and indivisible world.”
Russia, in the Kremlin’s view, bears no responsibility for the
current, frosty state of relations. President Vladimir Putin, who
has spoken to the participants of every gathering since the club’s
inception, offered a laundry list of the West’s diplomatic blunders
that brought on the chill, including NATO’s campaign against
Serbia, the allied invasion of Iraq, the intervention in Libya, and
the development of US missile defenses.
“We expected equal dialogue, that our interests would be
respected, that we would … meet each other halfway,” Putin said.
But the West “offered only unilateral solutions and pursued its
objectives at all costs.”
When it came to contemporary dilemmas, it was much the
same story: Russia is blameless and the West is acting in an
arrogant manner.
Syria repeatedly was cited as the litmus test for the state of
Russian-Western relations. Lavrov alleged that while Russian
diplomats have made many efforts to work directly with
Washington regarding Syria, the United States had proven unable,
or unwilling, to fulfill pledges to Moscow to separate “moderate”
terrorists from more extremist ones.
Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov claimed that
the Middle East was in a “systematic, multi-level crisis” due to
Western efforts to promote forceful regime change. He also
accused the West of advocating the adoption of democratization