NewsX World:  two segments from the midday wrap-up

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“Russia-India Ties Factor of Stability in International Relations”

Regrettably I was obliged to contradict the enthusiastic words of the host about the ongoing visit of the Indian foreign minister to Moscow as he and Sergei Lavrov prepare for President Putin’s state visit to India next month. The secondary sanctions on India imposed by Donald Trump have done considerable damage to Russian-Indian commercial ties as I explain here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BVbg8NyE4QI

The host spoke glowingly about Zelensky’s visit to Spain today in which he spoke to parliament and spent time with the prime minister. It was unclear exactly what he expected to take away. However, that is not relevant since this visit, following on his visits to Greece last weekend to reach an accord on supplies of petroleum gas for this winter’s heating and his visit to France to sign an agreement on purchase of 100 Rafael fighter jets over the coming 10 years is more about image than anything else. Against the background of a highly damaging corruption scandal among officials very close to the president, Zelensky was keen to demonstrate his continuing usefulness to the cause of the war by his mission abroad this week.  Meanwhile his next stop will be Istanbul, where he is expected to meet with Witkoff and Erdogan to discuss his readiness for renewing peace talks with Moscow.  There again the essence is PR, given that under present conditions Russia has no desire whatsoever to sign a peace with the head of the regime it now expects to remove by force on the strength of its military victory on the battlefield

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Published by gilbertdoctorow

Gilbert Doctorow's latest book, "War Diaries. The Russia-Ukraine War, 2022-2023" is a unique contribution to literature on the war thanks to the author's reports on the Russian home front written during his periodic visits to St Petersburg at a time when Russia no longer issued visas and nearly all Western journalists had left the country. Doctorow's two-volume "Memoirs of a Russianist" published in 2020 also constitutes a category of its own, consisting largely of diary entries rather than reminiscences written decades later.. Volume 2 focuses on the community of 50,000 expatriate managers working and living in Moscow during the 1990s, about which none of his peers has yet to write. Gilbert Doctorow is a professional Russia watcher and actor in Russian affairs going back to 1965. He is a magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College (1967), a past Fulbright scholar, and holder of a Ph.D. with honors in history from Columbia University (1975). After completing his studies, Mr. Doctorow pursued a business career focused on the USSR and Eastern Europe. For twenty-five years he worked for US and European multinationals in marketing and general management with regional responsibility. From 1998-2002, Doctorow served as the Chairman of the Russian Booker Literary Prize in Moscow. During the 2010-2011 academic year, he was a Visiting scholar of the Harriman Institute, Columbia University. Mr. Doctorow is a long-time resident of Brussels.

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