This Week's Highlights:

• The Pentagon has unveiled details of a proposed $750 billion national defense budget that, it says, reflects the military’s shifting emphasis from counterinsurgencies to competition with China and Russia, according to The Washington Post. An Obama-era Pentagon official told the newspaper what evidence she sees of such a strategic shift.
• With the INF Treaty set to expire this summer, the U.S. military plans to test a ground-launched cruise missile with a range of about 600 miles in August and a midrange ballistic missile (about 1,800-2,500 miles) in November, according to senior U.S. defense officials cited by The Washington Post.
• Russia remains the world’s second-largest arms exporter after the U.S. despite five years of declining sales abroad, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute has said, according to several media reports. In 2014-2018, SIPRI found, “U.S. exports of major arms were 75 percent higher than Russia’s,” versus 12 percent in 2009-2013.
• Two men in Georgia have been arrested for allegedly attempting to sell uranium, a potential ingredient in a radioactive "dirty bomb," according to RFE/RL. An investigator told reporters the suspects had been arrested with just over 40 grams of radioactive uranium 238 and planned to sell it for $2.8 million to an unspecified buyer.
• According to a Russian pollster, 77 percent of respondents in “mainland” Russia approve of the annexation of Crimea, but just 39 percent said it was beneficial to the country, The Moscow Times reported. Since the annexation, the Netherlands have become Russia’s second-largest trading partner (after China) and Russian investment in Austria has nearly doubled, according to a CSIS report cited by the Wall Street Journal. 
• According to Alexei Kudrin, head of Russia’s Audit Chamber, Moscow and St. Petersburg produce a combined 32 percent of the country’s economic output, compared with 25 percent 15 years ago, Bloomberg reported.
• A report released this month by Estonia’s Foreign Intelligence Service says that Russia’s Federal Security Service regularly buys updated volumes of specialized “yellow books” listing the names and contact information for U.S. government employees.

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

Nuclear security and safety:

• Two men in Georgia have been arrested for allegedly attempting to sell uranium, a potential ingredient in a radioactive "dirty bomb." A Georgian State Security Service investigator told reporters that the suspects had been arrested in the southwestern city of Kobuleti, and that they had just over 40 grams of radioactive uranium 238 and planned to sell it for $2.8 million to an unspecified buyer. (RFE/RL, 03.13.19)
• U.S. President Donald Trump’s $16.5 billion FY 2020 budget request for the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) is an increase of $1.3 billion, or 8.3 percent, above the FY 2019-enacted level. The budget request includes $12.4 billion for weapons activities, and nearly $2 billion for defense nuclear nonproliferation. (National Nuclear Security Administration, 03.11.19)

North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs:

• North Korea is considering dropping nuclear talks with the U.S. and restarting missile launches and nuclear tests just weeks after U.S. President Donald Trump walked out of denuclearization talks with Kim Jong Un. Russia wants dialogue between North Korea and the U.S. to continue, the state-run RIA Novosti news agency cited the Russian Foreign Ministry as saying on March 15. (Financial Times, 03.15.19, Reuters, 03.15.19)

Iran’s nuclear program and related issues:

• No significant developments.

New Cold War/saber rattling:

• No significant developments.

Military issues, including NATO-Russia relations:

• The Pentagon’s request for $718.3 billion in FY 2020 provides $14.1 billion for space, a 10 percent increase over last year’s budget, and $9.6 billion for cyber, a 15 percent increase over last year. (U.S. Defense Department, 03.12.19)
• The Pentagon’s 2020 defense budget request reflects a focus on the great power competition with Russia and China, according to the U.S. defense agency. (U.S. Defense Department, 03.12.19)
• The Pentagon on March 12 unveiled details of the Trump administration’s proposed $750 billion national defense budget, calling it an example of the military’s shifting emphasis from counterinsurgencies to competition with China and Russia. Susanna Blume, an Obama-era Pentagon official, saw promise for such a strategic shift. She said the decision to increase the number of Virginia-class nuclear-powered fast-attack submarines from two to three, invest in unmanned Navy vessels and finalize a decision on how to organize the Space Force represent steps toward implementing the strategy. (The Washington Post, 03.12.19) 
• Turkey's pending purchase of the Russian S-400 missile defense system presents a national security problem for NATO, which would not be able to deploy F-35 aircraft alongside the Russian systems, senior U.S. officials said March 14. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said it is not possible for Turkey to back out of the deal with Russia. (Reuters, 03.14.19, Reuters, 03.14.19)
• House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Sen. Mitch McConnell, the majority leader, extended a bipartisan invitation on March 11 to the head of NATO to address a joint session of Congress. The invitation is an unsubtle jab at U.S. President Donald Trump's foreign policy and is meant to underscore broad congressional support for the alliance. (New York Times, 03.12.19)
• NATO’s 2018 annual report showed that the alliance moved closer to a pledge to dedicate 2 percent of national economic output on defense every year, with European allies reaching the 1.51 percent level, a five-year high. Spending rose sharply in the Baltics, Poland and the Netherlands, but only six governments met the target sought by the U.S., while Germany lagged and spending in Canada fell by almost 11 percent last year. (Reuters, 03.14.19)
• U.S. acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan has rejected reports that the Pentagon plans to force allies to pay sharply higher costs for the right to host U.S. forces on their territory. (RFE/RL, 03.15.19)
• The commander of NATO forces in Europe, U.S. General Curtis Scaparrotti, has said that Russia continues to be the "primary threat" to Euro-Atlantic security and voiced concern about Moscow's military modernization program. (RFE/RL, 03.13.19)
• "In our games, when we fight Russia and China, blue gets its ass handed to it," David Ochmanek, an analyst for the California think tank RAND, said as part of a March 7 panel discussion at the Center for a New American Security. "It turns out U.S. superweapons have a little too much Achilles in their heels," reporter Sydney Freedberg, Jr. quipped. According to Ochmanek, American bases are vulnerable to attack by long-range missiles. So are large warships sailing the open seas. (The National Interest, 03.11.19)
• U.S. Defense Undersecretary for Policy John Rood met March 13 in Warsaw with Polish defense officials to negotiate a permanent presence of U.S. forces in the former Soviet satellite, a project long sought by Poland that it has pitched to the U.S. as “Fort Trump.” “We have come forward with ... a very serious, robust offer,” Rood’s deputy for international affairs told a House committee the same day, adding that she hoped the Warsaw meeting would provide “a solid foundation to work from,” with an agreement finalized in “six months to a year” if the Polish deputy defense minister accepts Rood’s offer. (Defense One, 03.13.19)

Missile defense:

• Despite rolling out an ambitious administration policy that sought a large-scale recalibration of missile defenses, the Trump administration requested $9.4 billion for the Missile Defense Agency for FY 2020, a decrease of almost $1.1 billion from the enacted 2019 budget. (The Washington Post, 03.12.19)

Nuclear arms control:

• The U.S. military plans to test a ground-launched cruise missile with a range of about 600 miles in August and a midrange ballistic missile with a range of about 1,800 to 2,500 miles in November, according to senior U.S. defense officials. The testing, production and deployment of missiles with those ranges is prohibited by the INF Treaty. The formal six-month wait period before the final expiry of the agreement ends this summer. (The Washington Post, 03.13.19)
• Germany, Sweden and the Netherlands opened an arms control conference in Berlin on March 15 urging Moscow "to return to complete and verifiable compliance" to save the INF Treaty. German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas says it's also time for broader treaties, as nuclear weapons proliferate to countries such as China, North Korea, India and Pakistan. (AP, 03.15.19)

Counterterrorism:

• Russian authorities say two alleged Islamic State militants have been killed in the country's southern Stavropol region that borders the mainly Muslim-populated North Caucasus. (RFE/RL, 03.14.19)

Conflict in Syria:

• The Syrian army, aided by Russian warplanes, attacked rebel-held towns in Idlib in northwestern Syria on March 13 in the most extensive bombardment in months against the last remaining rebel bastion in the country, rebels, rescuers and residents said. (Reuters, 03.13.19)
• Hundreds of Islamic State militants and family members surrendered on March 14 as U.S.-backed Syrian rebel forces moved closer to crushing the militants in their final sliver of territory in the eastern part of the country. (RFE/RL, 03.15.19)
• In Syria, the Russian armed forces carried out 166 cruise missile strikes. "For the first time in the course of the operation in Syria, the armed forces have carried out 166 strikes with long-range air-launched and sea-based cruise missiles against terrorist facilities," Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu told the State Duma’s Defense Committee. (TASS, 03.12.19)
• Russia tested 316 pieces of military equipment in Syria, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu told lawmakers on March 11. (The Moscow Times, 03.11.19)
• Russia will seek to have sanctions on Damascus lifted at the international donor conference on Syria in Brussels, Russia’s permanent representative to the U.N., Gennady Gatilov, has said. (Interfax, 03.12.19)
• "Turkey and Russia are working to create a joint center to coordinate activities in [the northwestern Syrian province of] Idlib," the Anadolu news agency cited Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar as saying March 14. Akar provided no details about the center. Meanwhile, Turkish forces last week began patrolling in Idlib as part of a deal struck with Russia and Iran. (TASS, 03.14.19, RFE/RL, 03.09.19)
• An Armenian demining officer recently deployed to Syria has been seriously wounded while clearing landmines near Aleppo. (RFE/RL, 03.08.19)

Cyber security:

• Cyberattacks from Russia, China, North Korea and Iran are increasingly sophisticated and, until recently, were done with little concern for the consequences, the top Pentagon cyber leaders told a congressional committee on March 13. They said the U.S. is prepared to use cyber operations more aggressively to strike back. A Navy review released this week described significant breaches of naval systems and concluded that the service is losing the cyber war. (AP, 03.13.19, AP, 03.13.19)

Elections interference:

• Andrew Weissmann, one of U.S. special counsel Robert Mueller’s top prosecutors, is leaving the Justice Department, according to a National Public Radio report on March 14, possibly signaling the end of the federal investigation into alleged Russian interference in the presidential election. (Reuters, 03.14.19)
• The U.S. House of Representatives has unanimously approved a resolution calling for any final report in special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation to be made public. It’s a symbolic action designed to pressure Attorney General William Barr to release as much information as possible when the probe is concluded. (AP, 03.14.19)
• The Senate Intelligence Committee met in private March 11 with Simona Mangiante Papadopoulos, whose husband unwittingly helped prompt the FBI investigation of U.S. President Donald Trump's campaign, as part of its ongoing probe of Russian interference in the 2016 election. The panel asked Mangiante Papadopoulos about her former employer Joseph Mifsud, a London-based professor with suspected ties to the Kremlin. (The Washington Post, 03.12.19)
• Russia sought to interfere with U.S. election systems during the 2018 midterm elections, a U.S. official told CNN March 13. (CNN, 03.13.19)
• A report by a former FBI cyberexpert unsealed in a federal court in Miami found evidence that suggests Russian agents used networks operated by Aleksej Gubarev, a Russian technology entrepreneur who runs companies in Europe and the U.S., to start their hacking operation during the 2016 presidential campaign. (New York Times, 03.14.19)
• Former FBI lawyer Lisa Page defended herself and the bureau last year against accusations that bias against U.S. President Donald Trump affected federal investigations of the Trump campaign's suspected Russia ties and of Hillary Clinton's emails, according to a transcript released March 12 by the top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee. (The Washington Post, 03.13.19)
• The top Democrat and Republican on the House Judiciary Committee are offering diverging interpretations of former acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker's closed-door testimony regarding whether or not the president called him to discuss the Michael Cohen case. (The Hill, 03.13.19, The Washington Post, 03.13.19)
• U.S. President Donald Trump's former adviser Roger Stone will go to trial on Nov. 5, making it likely that the legal fallout from special counsel Robert Mueller's Russia probe will stretch through much of 2019. (Reuters, 03.14.19)

Energy exports:

• The U.S. is on track to become a net petroleum exporter by 2021 and will soon after surpass Russia and Saudi Arabia, currently the world's largest oil exporter, the International Energy Agency said March 11. (Wall Street Journal, 03.11.19)
• U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has said the U.S. is seeking to "bring Iranian crude oil exports down to zero as quickly as market conditions will permit." And he warned Europe not to get "hooked on Russian gas through the Nord Stream 2 project." (RFE/RL, 03.13.19)
• U.S. threats to impose sanctions on the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline contradict international law, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on March 12. (TASS, 03.12.19)
• When German Chancellor Angela Merkel took her seat at the Oval Office table last spring, U.S. President Donald Trump told her "Angela, you got to stop buying gas from Putin." For Germany, with Europe's highest non-household electricity prices, Russian gas offers a price advantage, currently around 20 percent lower than American liquefied natural gas, according to the German government. (Wall Street Journal, 03.11.19)

Bilateral economic ties:

• No significant developments.

Other bilateral issues:

• The United States, Canada and European Union imposed sweeping sanctions on March 15 over Russia’s actions against Ukraine, including its 2018 attack on Ukrainian ships, annexation of Crimea and activities in eastern Ukraine. The U.S. Treasury said it targeted four members of Russia’s Federal Security Services for their involvement in the naval clash in the Kerch Strait, six Russian defense firms operating in Crimea and two Ukrainian separatists for backing “illegitimate separatist government elections” in eastern Ukraine. (Reuters, 03.15.19)
• Russian billionaire Oleg Deripaska sued the U.S. Treasury Department and Secretary Steven Mnuchin in Washington on March 15, asking a federal judge to lift the restrictions against him. Deripaska, who made his fortune in the metals industry, is fighting back against American sanctions that he said are unfairly destroying his global businesses and are based on unproven allegations about his close ties to the government of Russian President Vladimir Putin. In his complaint, the magnate said he is “the latest victim” of “political infighting and ongoing reaction to Russia’s purported interference” with the 2016 U.S. presidential election. (Bloomberg, 03.15.19)
• Jon Huntsman, the U.S. ambassador to Russia, said he would not attend the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum while American investor Michael Calvey remained in jail. No important U.S. company leaders have made plans to attend the June event. (Financial Times, 03.12.19)
• The Kremlin on March 12 shrugged off talk of a possible boycott by U.S. companies of Russia's showcase International Economic Forum over the arrest of prominent U.S. investor Michael Calvey, saying such boycotts had come to nothing in the past. (Reuters, 03.12.19)
• The United States on March 15 asked why Russia had not provided any evidence to back up its accusation that Paul Whelan, a detained former U.S. marine, was a spy, a day after Whelan alleged he was being mistreated by a "kangaroo court." Earlier, the U.S. called on Russia to permit increased access to Whelan and U.S. Embassy spokeswoman Andrea Kalan said on March 11 that officials would visit the 49-year-old "later this week." The Moscow City Court on March 14 upheld the ruling that ordered keeping Whelan in jail at least until the end of May. (Reuters, 03.15.19, RFE/RL, 03.12.19, AP, 03.14.19)
• Since U.S. intelligence agencies concluded that Russia attempted to interfere in the 2016 presidential election, the Department of Justice has tried to compel Sputnik's associates to register as foreign agents under the Foreign Agents Registration Act. There is one holdout: Arnold Ferolito, owner of RM Broadcasting, which leases airtime to Sputnik on 1390 AM in Washington. (The Washington Post, 03.11.19)
• Russia remains the world’s second-largest arms exporter after the United States despite five years of declining sales abroad, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) has said. “U.S. exports of major arms were 75 percent higher than Russia’s in the 2014–18 period, while they were only 12 percent higher in 2009-13,” SIPRI said in its report of global arms transfers. (The Moscow Times, 03.11.19, RFE/RL, 03.11.19)
• A senior U.S. Treasury official closely involved with sanctions policy told a Congressional panel this week that her agency has created a new “strategic impact unit,” or SIU, focused on Russia. The specialized unit—one of six—will be part of the Treasury Department’s Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence and is meant to enhance collaboration across the office’s “components,” according to Under Secretary Sigal Mandelker’s prepared remarks to a House subcommittee presented on March 12. The other five SIUs will focus, respectively, on North Korea, Iran, Islamic State, virtual currency and human rights and corruption. (Russia Matters, 03.13.19)
• The U.S. House of Representatives has passed a measure sharply criticizing Russian President Vladimir Putin for what it says is the Kremlin’s involvement in the killing of opposition activist Boris Nemtsov and the targeting of other political opponents. (RFE/RL, 03.13.19)
• In its Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2018, the U.S. State Department said Russian authorities had committed or been implicated in "severe" human rights abuses at home and in foreign countries, citing in particular Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula and eastern Ukraine. (RFE/RL, 03.13.19)
• A report released this month by the Estonian Defense Ministry’s Foreign Intelligence Service says that Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) regularly purchases updated volumes of the Federal Yellow Book and Congressional Yellow Book, which list the names and contact information for U.S. government employees. (Russia Matters, 03.12.19)
• Russia accused an unnamed employee of the U.S. Embassy in Moscow of attempting to bring a mortar shell with a fuse in his luggage to Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport. The mortar shell contained no explosives. (The Moscow Times, 03.11.19)
• U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar's nascent presidential campaign has been dogged by allegations that the Minnesota Democrat mistreated her staff. In a March 14 interview, the senator said her toughness would be an asset on the world stage—namely when dealing with Russian President Vladimir Putin. (CNN, 03.15.19)
• As U.S. investor Michael Calvey ended his first month in detention on March 14, prominent Russian businessmen told Russian President Vladimir Putin they are concerned the case will put pressure on business. (The Moscow Times, 03.14.19)

II. Russia’s domestic news

Politics, economy and energy:

• According to results published by Russian state-funded pollster FOM on March 14, 77 percent of respondents in Russia's mainland approve of the annexation of Crimea. Just 39 percent of respondents, however, said it was beneficial to the country. That marks a drop from 67 percent of Russians who saw benefits in the spring of 2015, Vedomosti cited the poll results as saying. The share of Russians who saw equal benefit and harm in the annexation has risen from 15 percent to 39 percent in that period, it said. (The Moscow Times, 03.15.19)
• Legislation enabling Russian authorities to block websites and hand out punishment for "fake news" and material deemed insulting to the state or the public is headed to Russian President Vladimir Putin's desk for his signature. (RFE/RL, 03.13.19)
  • Thousands rallied in downtown Moscow to protest an internet bill on March 10. Similar rallies took place across Russia. Critics of the bill say it will increase state control over the Internet and facilitate censorship. (RFE/RL, 03.11.19)
• Some $750 billion has been moved from Russia in the last 25 years, Bloomberg reported on March 12. (The Moscow Times, 03.13.19)
• According to Alexei Kudrin, head of Russia’s Audit Chamber, Moscow and St. Petersburg produce a combined 32 percent of the country’s economic output, compared with 25 percent 15 years ago. (Bloomberg, 03.07.19.)
  • Moscow and St. Petersburg ranked in the bottom 50 of the world’s most livable cities and have been named the two most dangerous cities in Europe, according to rankings from a global consulting firm. (The Moscow Times, 03.14.19)
• Russia’s Sberbank, VTB, Gazprombank and other banks are examining how they can provide each other with access to U.S. dollars or other major foreign currencies by using so-called correspondent accounts, sources familiar with the matter said, in the event that they are hit by fresh U.S. sanctions. (Reuters, 03.14.19)
• Russia’s Natural Resources and Environment Ministry estimates that the combined cost of the country’s oil, gas and other resources amounts to 60 percent of its gross domestic product, the RBC news website reported. (The Moscow Times, 03.14.19)
• Russia’s Finance Ministry and central bank are prepared to drop regulations in 2020 that require Russia’s exporters to convert their foreign exchange revenue into rubles, Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said March 14. (Reuters, 03.14.19)
• A recent report by a Moscow-based environmental watchdog has cast doubt on claims by Rosatom, Russia’s state nuclear corporation, that it has over $130 billion in nuclear reactor construction projects ongoing in foreign countries. According to the analysis by Ecodefense, the amount of income Rosatom can claim from its overseas projects is likely closer to $90 billion. (Bellona, 03.13.19)
• Roman Abramovich’s sale of a stake in Russia’s biggest mining company, Norilsk Nickle, shows investor appetite for the country’s assets is returning. (Bloomberg, 03.13.19)
• One in 10 foreigners who visited Russia visa-free for the FIFA World Cup last summer took advantage of a visa waiver to return to the country by the end of 2018, Russia’s top lender Sberbank has said. (The Moscow Times, 03.11.19)
• Doctors at a hospital in southern Russia have conducted what they say is Europe’s first surgery with the help of exoskeletons, state-run lender Sberbank announced on March 11. (The Moscow Times, 03.12.19)
• Moscow may soon leave the Council of Europe, depriving Russians of what activists call the last hope for justice and crushing efforts to integrate the country into the international rights framework. (AFP, 03.15.19)
• Amnesty International has reiterated its call on Russian authorities to release Chechen human rights activist Oyub Titiyev, calling his trial on “fabricated” drug-possession charges “an affront to justice.” (RFE/RL, 03.11.19)
• A Chechen blogger living in hiding in Poland has said the blood feud declared against him by a close ally of Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov is nothing less than a death threat. Magomed Daudov on March 9 called Tumso Abdurakhmanov "an enemy to me and my brothers" after the blogger called Kadyrov's late father a traitor on his YouTube channel. (RFE/RL, 03.13.19)
• At least two Moscow courts have sided with the Federal Security Service’s (FSB’s) refusal to grant gulag historian Sergei Prudovsky access to files containing the names of so-called NKVD troika judges who served on Stalin-era panels that issued death sentences without trials, Kommersant reported on March 14. (The Moscow Times, 03.14.19)
• Several of Russia’s state organizations are racing to meet a June 15 deadline to create a national strategy that aligns government, military, academic and private resources to speed the country’s development of artificial intelligence. (Defense One, 03.14.19)
• The Kremlin plans to attract up to 10 million Russian-speaking migrants in the next six years to reverse the country’s population decline, Kommersant reported on March 14. (The Moscow Times, 03.14.19)
• Despite being under house arrest in Moscow, famed Russian director Kirill Serebrennikov has staged an opera 2,000 kilometers away in Hamburg, Germany. (RFE/RL, 03.11.19)
• Russia plans to send delinquent youngsters to military-patriotic re-education camps and to install special software blocking banned websites in schools, the head of Russia’s Security Council has said. (The Moscow Times, 03.13.19)
• Russia could raise the legal drinking age to 21 from 18 and restrict alcohol sales in residential areas this year, according to the RBC news website. The change would be part of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s ambitious plan to overhaul Russia’s economy by the end of his last term in office. (The Moscow Times, 03.15.19)

Defense and aerospace:

• A Russian-American crew of three has arrived at the International Space Station, marking success in the second attempt to reach the craft after an aborted launch in October. (RFE/RL, 03.15.19)
• The Russian military received more than 3,700 new tanks and armored vehicles, over 1,000 warplanes and combat helicopters, 161 warships and seven submarines in the past six years, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu told lawmakers on March 11. More than 200 intercontinental ballistic missiles, 57 military spacecraft and 17 Bal and Bastion coastal defense systems entered into service, he said. The number of professional soldiers has doubled to 394,000 servicemen since 2012, he said. (The Moscow Times, 03.11.19)
• The Russian military plans to bolster its positions in the Arctic with additional air defense systems as it flexes its muscle in the hydrocarbon-rich region, a top naval commander has said. “New air defense formation units will soon be placed in the Yakut village of Tiksi,” Adm. Nikolai Yevmenov, the commander of Russia’s Northern Fleet, told the Russian Defense Ministry’s Krasnaya Zvezda publication. (The Moscow Times, 03.13.19)

Security, law-enforcement and justice:

• Grim videos posted online by the independent newspaper Novaya Gazeta appear to provide fresh evidence of inmates being tortured and abused by guards at a prison in the city of Yaroslavl that has been at the center of concerns about violence against convicts in Russia. (RFE/RL, 03.11.19)
• Russia’s Federal Security Service has filed a defamation lawsuit demanding that the investigative Novaya Gazeta newspaper remove reports that accused the agency of torture, the paper has said. (The Moscow Times, 03.13.19)
• Vadim Belousov, a Russian State Duma deputy from a small opposition party has been detained on suspicion of accepting 3.2 billion rubles ($49 million) in cooperation with a former governor. (The Moscow Times, 03.15.19)

III. Foreign affairs, trade and investment

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

• Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov held talks with Venezuela's foreign minister in Vienna March 14. (Reuters, 03.14.19)
• Russian top oil producer Rosneft spent a fortune on joint ventures in Venezuela even though it suspected it was losing out on millions of dollars, documents show. It continued investing, sources say, because the Kremlin wanted to support its ally in South America. “From the very beginning it was a purely political project. We all had to contribute,” said an executive at a Russian oil firm that partnered with Rosneft in Venezuela. (Reuters, 03.14.19)
• U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on March 11 blamed Russia and Cuba for causing Venezuela's political crisis by supporting President Nicolas Maduro. His comments came after the U.S. Treasury Department imposed sanctions on Russian bank Evrofinance Mosnarbank for helping Venezuelan state oil firm PDVSA evade U.S. financial restrictions. Pompeo said Russian oil giant Rosneft was also defying U.S. sanctions by buying oil from PDVSA, which was sanctioned in January. (Reuters, 03.12.19)
  • Rosneft said on March 12 that U.S. statements that it had violated U.S. sanctions in its Venezuela activities were "groundless accusations." (Reuters, 03.12.19)
  • Russian bank VTB has begun a procedure to hand over to the Russian state property agency its stake in Evrofinance Mosnarbank, a bank hit with U.S. sanctions this week over its dealings with Venezuela. (Reuters, 03.12.19)
• The European Parliament has overwhelmingly voted to approve a report stating that Russia “can no longer be considered a ‘strategic partner’” and that “the EU cannot envisage a gradual return to ‘business as usual’ until Russia fully implements the [2015] Minsk Agreement [which lays out a process for achieving peace in eastern Ukraine] and restores the territorial integrity of Ukraine.” (RFE/RL, 03.12.19)
  • The European Parliament on March 14 passed a resolution urging EU member states to adopt a sanctions framework similar to the Magnitsky Act in order to punish human rights offenders. (RFE/RL, 03.14.19)
  • A recommendation by the European Parliament calls Russia "the main source of disinformation in Europe" and appeals for increased funding for the European Union's antipropaganda East StratCom Task Force. (RFE/RL, 03.13.19)
• Russian investment in Austria nearly doubled since the 2014 crisis over Moscow's annexation of Crimea, according to a report by the Center for Strategic and International Studies. The investment accounted for more than 16 percent of foreign direct investment in Austria in 2017, compared with about 8 percent in 2013, the report says. Italian banks are second only to Switzerland's in financial exposure to Russia, with claims worth almost $23 billion, according to the report. And the Netherlands has become Russia's second-largest trading partner. (Wall Street Journal, 03.11.19)
• As the Swedish Security Service released its annual threat assessment, the head of the service said that, “In the past few years we have seen that Russia in particular has improved its ability to actively and covertly influence other states,” making it necessary to enhance the abilities of the service “and other agencies tasked with combating crime and other gray-area activities.” (Russia Matters, 03.14.19)
• The Kremlin has reversed course in its negotiations to cede control of the disputed Kuril Islands to Japan, the RBC news website reported, citing unnamed sources. “There are no … plans” to transfer the Kurils to Japan, an unnamed source close to the Kremlin told RBC and a source close to the Russian Foreign Ministry confirmed on March 12. Russia does not decline the handover to Japan outright “for reasons of diplomacy,” the Foreign Ministry source added. According to the same source, the Kremlin believes Japan will not agree to the conditions that it recognize Russia’s sovereignty over the islands and provide ironclad guarantees that the United States will not station troops there. (The Moscow Times, 03.12.19)
• German Chancellor Angela Merkel mentioned the March 15 student protests for climate protection in the context of Russia's hybrid warfare. “In Germany now, children are protesting for climate protection—that is a really important issue,” she said. “But you can't imagine that all German children, after years, and without any outside influence, suddenly hit on the idea that they have to take part in this process.” “Hybrid warfare from Russia can be felt every day in every European country,” she added. “This hybrid warfare in the internet is hard to detect, because you suddenly have movements that you wouldn't have thought would appear.” (Forbes, 03.15.19)
• Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova lashed out at Western countries on March 15 for refusing to take back foreign-born militants who have been fighting in Syria and Iraq. (AP, 03.15.19)
• Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres discussed international issues in a phone call on March 15, the Russian Foreign Ministry reported. (TASS, 03.15.19)
• French carmaker PSA Group’s Opel said it would resume production at a factory in Kaluga, Russia, in the fourth quarter after exiting the Russian market in 2015. (Reuters, 03.14.19)

China:

• Authorities in Siberia have suspended the construction of a controversial Chinese bottling plant in Lake Baikal following public outcry and pressure from the Kremlin. (The Moscow Times, 03.15.19)

Ukraine:

• Comic actor Volodymyr Zelenskiy has extended his lead in Ukraine’s presidential election race, according to an opinion poll published on March 13. The poll by the Kiev-based SOCIS survey showed Zelenskiy with 20.7 percent of votes, with incumbent Petro Poroshenko second at 13.2 percent and opposition leader Yulia Tymoshenko third with 11 percent. (Reuters, 03.13.19)
• The U.S. draft defense budget for 2020 may assign $250 million to Ukraine for strengthening its security and defense, the Ukrainian Embassy to the U.S. said. (Interfax, 03.13.19)
• The U.S. is transferring two Coast Guard cutters to Kiev and plans to send coastal radars to Ukraine and three Black Sea neighbors, U.S. officials said. The U.S. is also helping construct a maritime operations center for Ukraine near Odessa and sending naval ships on port visits. (Wall Street Journal, 03.11.19)
• Ukraine has been freed of some restrictions on the range of missile flights and now intends to develop high-precision weapons, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said. Because Russia suspended the INF Treaty and the United States withdrew from it, "we, too, as Ukrainians, have lost some of the restrictions and obligations we had adhered to before," Poroshenko said. (Interfax, 03.11.19)
• Units of Ukraine's 72nd Mechanized Brigade are preparing for training exercises at the Joint Multinational Training Center in Yavoriv in the Lviv region. The commander of the Joint Multinational Training Group-Ukraine (JMTG-U), U.S. Lt. Col. Matthew Smith, said training at the brigade level would be the first for foreign instructors and Ukrainian servicemen. (Interfax, 03.12.19)
• The EU is focusing on economic measures to help Ukraine's southeast. The EU will set up an office in the region in the next month, and aims to start offering microcredits and open vocational educational and training centers. (Wall Street Journal, 03.11.19)
• Vienna is disappointed with Kiev’s decision to prevent Russians from monitoring Ukraine’s presidential election, Austrian Foreign Minister Karin Kneissl said on March 12 following talks with Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov. (TASS, 03.12.19)
• Austrian reporter Christian Wehrschuetz said he feared being attacked by Ukrainian nationalists over reporting critical of the government in Kiev, according to the Ukrainian Security Service. Now they're using a one-year entry ban to keep him out of the country. (RFE/RL, 03.12.19)
• Igor Girkin, the Russian former commander of militants in eastern Ukraine, is out of cash and out of favor with the Kremlin, leading him to sell a gold medal he was awarded in 2014 for his role in the occupation of Crimea. (RFE/RL, 03.12.19)
• Police in Ukraine say that 22 officers were injured in clashes with far-right protesters who tried to attack a presidential motorcade ahead of this month’s election. Criminal investigations have been opened into the violence in both Kiev and Cherkasy, police said. (RFE/RL, 03.09.19)
• Once a globe-trotting political operative who helped elect U.S. President Donald Trump and three of his Republican predecessors, Paul Manafort returned to federal court March 13 as a felon apologizing for his criminal conduct and awaiting word on how much more prison time he could receive in the hard fall from his power-broker days. Prosecutor Andrew Weissmann said that Manafort led a sophisticated scheme "to avoid a duty all Americans have" to pay their taxes, Weissmann said, hiding wealth in 30 foreign bank accounts containing more than $50 million for his work for the government of Ukraine and Oleg Deripaska. (The Washington Post, 03.13.19)

Russia’s other post-Soviet neighbors:

• Kyrgyz authorities have evacuated residents of two villages near a disputed section of its border with Tajikistan following deadly clashes in the area. The unrest erupted on March 13 after Kyrgyzstan relaunched work on a controversial road in the disputed section of the Tajik-Kyrgyz border. At least two people—both identified as Tajik nationals—have been killed and dozens wounded in two days of clashes between residents of Ak-Sai and the Tajik village of Mehnatobod. A Kyrgyz police officer has also been wounded by gunfire. (RFE/RL, 03.15.19)
• Belarusian Foreign Ministry spokesman Anatol Hlaz has criticized Russian envoy to Minsk Mikhail Babich's recent public statements about the two countries integration, calling them "artificial and juggled figures." (RFE/RL, 03.15.19)
• Azerbaijan has launched large-scale military maneuvers ahead of an expected first meeting between President Ilham Aliyev and new Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian. (RFE/RL, 03.12.19)
• Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev has rejected an Armenian proposal to include Karabakh officials in the talks on the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian reiterated on March 14 that the inclusion of officials from the disputed region in the settlement process remained a priority to Yerevan. (RFE/RL, 03.14.19)
• As the Islamic State's attempt to establish a caliphate crumbles, many countries are turning their backs on children born into the extremist group. Tajikistan is not one of those countries. "We're planning to bring them home," the country's ambassador to Iraq and Kuwait, Zubaidullo Zubaidzoda, told RFE/RL. (RFE/RL, 03.12.19)
• Latvia has completed construction of a 93-kilometer barbed wire fence on the border with Russia to combat illegal migration, media outlets reported, citing the Latvian border service. (The Moscow Times, 03.12.19)
• Security services in Kazakhstan have detained the leader of a group that has raised concerns over problems faced by ethnic Kazakhs in China. A spokesman for the group, Volunteers of the Fatherland, told RFE/RL that Serikzhan Bilash was staying at an Almaty hotel when he was taken into custody at around 2:30 a.m. on March 10.  In an audio message relayed by his group on March 14, Bilash said he was pressured to make several video statements denouncing his activities by two plainclothes individuals who visited the place where he is currently under house arrest. (RFE/RL, 03.09.19, RFE/RL, 03.14.19)
• A text passed in the European Parliament on March 14 calls on the Kazakh authorities to "put an end to human rights abuses and all forms of political repression," noting that the number of political prisoners in the country has increased and the right to freedom of association remains largely restricted. (RFE/RL, 03.14.19)
• Russia has extradited Kazakh oligarch Zhomart Ertaev to Astana, where he is wanted on financial-fraud charges that his lawyers say are untrue. (RFE/RL, 03.15.19)
• At a March 4 meeting in Bucharest, the foreign ministers of Azerbaijan, Georgia, Romania and Turkmenistan established a Black Sea-Caspian Sea (BSCS) International Transport Corridor, a new trade route running between Turkmenistan's Caspian Sea port at Turkmenbashi City and Constanta on Romania's Black Sea coast. (RFE/RL, 03.11.19)
• Moldova’s Constitutional Court has confirmed the outcome of the country’s Feb. 24 parliamentary elections, rejecting an appeal by some opposition parties to invalidate the results in several constituencies. (RFE/RL, 03.09.19) 
• A court in Yerevan on March 15 has extended by two months the pretrial detention of Robert Kocharian, a lawyer for the former Armenian president. (RFE/RL, 03.15.19)
• Georgia's Minister for Reconciliation and Civic Equality has held talks with acting U.S. Ambassador to Tbilisi Ross Wilson about the death of a Georgian man in the custody of separatist officials in the breakaway region of Abkhazia. (RFE/RL, 03.14.19)

IV. Quoteworthy

• “I think Putin has given ample evidence that Russia can be threatening in lots of different ways that matter to us, and to our friends and allies, and to the international order. President Obama, for whom I have very high regard, kind of dismissively observed that Russia is just a regional power. Well, it’s a pretty goddamn big region, across 11 time zones. And even as a declining power, Russia can exert a fair amount of influence, often negative influence, on the landscape,” said William Burns, head of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. (The Atlantic, 03.09.19)