<DIV>Russia will use a carrot-and-stick approach to increase its dominance in the post-Soviet space, probably more stick than carrot. Russia uses its big businesses, especially the state-controlled ones, as an active element in foreign policy. (This is probably one reason behind Khodorkovsky's arrest -- Yukos was lobbying to privatize the state pipeline network, which would have quite damaged the Kremlin's ability to use oil shipments as a weapon. It is also why I think it likely that Yukos is going to be placed under state control, and why Gazprom is never going to be provatized.) Just in the past year, Russia obtained almost complete control of the energy sectors of both Armenia and Georgia, including Armenia's nuclear power station (in return for a debt write-off). The electricity grid monopoly is lobbying for a controlling interest in Ukraine's main power company -- or it has recently obtained it, I can't remember which. Russian companies sell oil, gas and power at below-market rates to other post-Soviet states, which gives Russia leverage over them -- it can turn off the lights at any time, as it periodically does in Georgia whenever the Tbilisi pisses the Kremlin off.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>"The Ukraine" is what it was referred to when it was part of the Russian Empire. "Ukraine" means "the borderlands," by the way. (Incidentally, the Russian word for "money" is derived from a Tatar word, like many other words involving trade and government. It is derived from the Golden Horde and Genghis Khan.) </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Kuchma said publically last year that Ukraine has zero chance of ever joining the EU, which is how he justified joining the Union of Four (Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, and Kazakhstan). When the USSR fell, the Kremlin assumed that the other republics would eventually have no choice but to come back to the fold. With the exceptions of the Baltic States and maybe Kazakhstan, it appears to have been right.<BR><BR><B><I>Grant Lee <grantlee@iinet.net.au></I></B> wrote:</DIV> <BLOCKQUOTE class=replbq style="PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT: #1010ff 2px solid">Chris said:<BR><BR>> I do think a community of post-Soviet states will exist; it will simply<BR>not be like the EU. It will be Moscow-dominated and Russocentric (like<BR>> the USSR and the Russian Empire)."<BR><BR>OK, my mistake. But what price/s (economic or otherwise) will Russia have to<BR>pay, to get the other ex-Soviet states to sign off on some kind of economic<BR>community?<BR><BR>> That said, I agree with the rest of what you wrote. Incidentally, if you<BR>call Ukraine "the Ukraine" to a Ukrainian nationalist, you will probably ><BR>wind up with a black eye.<BR><BR>I'll bear the advice in mind *lol* Is there a particular reason for this,<BR>other than formality?<BR><BR>Grant.<BR><BR><BR>___________________________________<BR>http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk</BLOCKQUOTE><p> <hr size=1><font face=arial size=-1>Do you Yahoo!?<br> Yahoo! Photos: <a href="http://pa.yahoo.com/*http://us.rd.yahoo.com/evt=23765/*http://photos.yahoo.c om/ph/print_splash">High-quality 4x6 digital prints for 25¢</a>