A renewed attempt to find some common ground with Russia
Stéphane Dion and counterpart’s meeting at Pacific nations summit mark a break in hostile front
This might seem a curious time for Ottawa to make a 180-degree turn in trying to restore healthy relations with Russia.
But there were Stéphane Dion, Canada’s foreign affairs minister, and his Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov, meeting Monday on the neutral ground of a Pacific nations summit in Laos for a 30-minute cover-the-waterfront talk on issues of common interests.
The under-reported incident is a breakthrough for both countries. Canada has been stridently critical of the Kremlin since Russia’s occupation of the Crimea two years ago and has prohibited contact between high-level officials in the two countries.
But the Trudeau government, which earned a mandate in October for its promise to strengthen ties with both Russia and China, has broken the silence.
To be sure, Dion reiterated to Lavrov on Monday Canada’s acute concern about Russia’s threatening gestures in Ukraine and elsewhere in Eastern Eu- rope, and the Kremlin’s controversial role in the Syrian conflict.
But the two chief diplomats found common ground on expanded trade, counterterrorism, space exploration, Arctic sovereignty, technology exchanges and other pressing issues.
This is a break in the hostile front the West has maintained against Russia after its theft of the Crimea in 2014. Western sanctions have been in place ever since.
Lately, the West has gone still further. Under NATO auspices, Canada announced earlier this month it will deploy a1,000-strong military force in Latvia to curb Russian influence in the Baltics. Other NATO members, including the U.S., the U.K. and Germany, are preparing to deploy forces in Lithuania and Estonia, and in Poland.
But after two years of trying to isolate Russia, that effort has failed. Russia’s internal economy has not been significantly weakened.
And the ambit of its dangerous mischief abroad has not been contained.
President Vladimir Putin’s airstrikes in Syria continue to slaughter innocent civilians in propping up the vile Bashir regime, which also nearly brought on a war between Russia and Turkey this year.
The Kremlin continues to stir up Russian ethnic separatism in Eastern Ukraine and has meddled in the promising deal by which Iran has pledged to scrap its nuclear-weapons ambitions.
Western hostility has helped drive the Kremlin and Tehran into each other’s arms, an informal partnership between two of the world’s most dangerous countries.
As for the impending NATO deployments, which will put Western troops on Russia’s borders, it was Russian neighbour Ukraine’s flirtation with joining NATO that forced the Kremlin’s hand in 2014. The Russians simply can’t abide German, American and other NATO tanks and troops on its borders.
When he unveiled Canada’s impending military mission in Latvia earlier this month, Dion was compelled to acknowledge that it’s “terribly unfortunate” that Canada has to send troops into Eastern Europe.
It’s fair to say that a contemptuous West is trying to break the will of a Russian petro-economy it believes is weak and driven into deep recession by the two-year-long deep slump in the world oil price.
Western policy-makers also note Russia’s widespread corruption, a technology-challenged industrial sector and Russia’s reliance on imports for an estimated 40 per cent of its foodstuffs.
Ottawa has a more nuanced regard of Russia.
As risible as Putin’s actions seem to Westerners, the Russian leader has long enjoyed an internal public-approval rating — ranging from 70 per cent to 80 per cent — that makes him a force to be dealt with.
Twice as large as its nearest rival, Russia spans the world’s largest land mass.
That land is super abundant in resources. Someday, an enlightened Moscow government will focus on developing them, rather than squander some $60 billion (U.S.) on the Putin vanity project known as the Sochi Olympics.
It’s worth considering certain Russian vital statistics.
Earlier this month, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) revised upward its forecast of Russian GDP growth for this year, now expected to be negative 1.2 per cent compared with the negative 1.5 per cent in the IMF’s previous report.
Remarkably, the IMF expects Russia to begin posting positive GDP growth — of about 1 per cent — by next year, with 1.2 per cent GDP growth forecast in 2018 and 1.5 per cent in 2019.
The relative vigour characterizing the Russian economy bears no resemblance to deeply troubled economies such as those of Spain and Brazil.
The IMF also forecasts that Russian inflation will drop from 6.6 per cent this year to 5.2 per cent in 2017, and just 4 per cent in 2018.
Taken together, those two factors alone — economic recovery and manageable rates of inflation — help explain Putin’s high popularity ratings.
According to the World Bank, the Russian poverty rate fell steadily during the decade beginning in 2002, from a high that year of 24.6 per cent to just 10.7 per cent in 2012.
The subsequent rise over the next three years, to 13.4 per cent in 2015, has to be counted as modest given the double-whammy of the Western-imposed sanctions and the oil-price plunge.
(The U.S. poverty rate in 2014 was 15.1 per cent; the Canadian rate that year was 9.4 per cent.)
According to figures from Bloomberg, in 2015, 11 major Russian industrial sectors grew, even as GDP shrank considerably, by 3.7 per cent.
These include information technology (up 28 per cent), pharmaceuticals (almost 9 per cent), medical equipment production (5 per cent), precise machinery manufacturing (5 per cent) and chemicals (more than 4 per cent).
That’s how well the Russian economy has been performing while firing on only a few cylinders.
Take away the one-time 2014 shock of a free-floating exchange rate for the ruble; the collapse of the world oil price, to as low as $29 (U.S.) per barrel, since recovered to about $45 (U.S.); and the Western sanctions; and the future buoyant prospects for the Russian economy are plain to see.
We pay a heavy price for punitive steps taken against others, regardless of the apparent justification.
As it has long been difficult to imagine a military solution in Syria, it’s impossible to imagine success in ending Northern Ireland’s “Troubles” without the good-faith negotiating that culminated in the Good Friday Accords.
As a practical matter, we need a mutually-beneficial relationship with Russia.
Russia’s state-owned railway is in a joint venture with Montreal-based Bombardier Inc. and Russian stateowned oil giant Rosneft has been a big investor in the cash-hungry Athabasca oilsands since 2012.
Greater comity with Russia, Dion said earlier this week, “is important for our allies, including Ukraine. It’s important for our own interests. After all, Russia is our neighbour in the Arctic.” dolive@thestar.ca