Is Journalism Worth Dying For__ Final Dispatches - Anna Politkovskaya [167]
Why should the Kremlin so hate Georgia? Why does Georgia so vehemently resist Kremlin control? And why does the Kremlin react so over-sensitively to Georgia’s opposition? What is there now about this country and its foremost representatives that makes the Kremlin think it can bomb its way through their territory? Is Russia’s war against Georgia a predictable result of our foreign policy, or is it an instant excuse generated by the Kremlin’s political imperatives? A post-Beslan, post-traumatic stress syndrome?
In seeking answers to these questions, let us go from the simple to the complex, bearing in mind that the underlying causes of many inter-state cataclysms (and a war between Russia and Georgia would be precisely such a catastrophe) should be sought in elementary matters which lie on the surface.
Of course, Mikheil Saakashvili is a very clever boy. Moreover, he is handsome and a favorite of journalists all over the world. Clever boys, handsome men and other people’s favorites have for a long time been systematically removed by Putin from his entourage. But what about the Georgians’ court? What do Putin and his entourage see and hear when they meet Saakashvili?
Our approach to the President of Georgia begins today with his Senior Adviser.
“Daniel Kunin,” he introduces himself in English, and Daniel’s smile is wholly American, as if you are his best friend. He is very likeable and very young, he’s not wearing a jacket, and his tie has slipped to one side. He has his shirt sleeves rolled up. Daniel doesn’t speak Russian, although he turns out to be a descendant of the anarchist Mikhail Bakunin. Savour this: in emigration Bakunin’s family dropped the first syllable of their surname in order not to be identified with their revolutionary kinsman, and now Kunin, with American citizenship, is the adviser to the Georgian President and has his salary paid by the US State Department. The source of his salary is no secret. Daniel himself tells me about it, and very humorously. When “Misha” invited him to become a senior aide, he agreed in principle and immediately sorted out all the details. The miserly salary Georgia could offer was not enough, so Misha organised him a salary in the USA.
Daniel is a very influential figure in the Georgian state civil service, where everybody now speaks English. This is comme il faut here, as it was comme il faut under the Tsarist regime to speak French. Even the President, Mikheil Saakashvili, and Prime Minister Zurab Zhvaniya, and the Speaker of Parliament, Nino Burdzhanadze, and the Deputy Defence Minister, Vasil Sikharulidze, and of course the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Salome Zurabishvili, are keen to be interviewed in English. Of course, that is their right if they find it more convenient.
One can imagine how, in this atmosphere of insistent Westernisation, members of Putin’s Administration must feel, accustomed as they are to seeing everybody in the Commonwealth of Independent States at their feet.
“What language do you usually use when you’re talking to your boss?” I ask Bakunin’s descendant.
“Usually English,” Daniel replies easily and cheerily. “Only during negotiations, when it’s important nobody else should understand us, do we talk in Georgian. I have taken private lessons, and used to work in Georgia in an NGO.”
An “NGO” is what they they call voluntary organizations.
“And you moved from an NGO straight into the position of a senior aide of the President of Georgia?”
“Yes, the entire government administration here is