VII. Read and translate the following newspaper article

Russian-British relations: a co-operation without a reset

The United Kingdom is the only large EU member state not to have close, friendly relations with Russia. The key reason for this seems to be the lack of readiness in London to make the economic concessions Russia expects. Prime Minister David Cameron’s visit to Moscow on 12 September – the first in several years at this level – fits in with the efforts his government has been making for a year or so to improve mutual relations. Although it failed to bring the breakthrough, it nevertheless confirmed that both countries, despite their political differences, are willing to continue their pragmatic economic co-operation.

The cooling of Russian-British relations

Russian-British relations, which were very good in 2001–2002 (for example, the then Prime Minister Tony Blair was the main initiator and advocate of establishing closer NATO-Russia co-operation), became significantly colder later. This was caused by problems regarding both political issues and economic relations.
Russia viewed the United Kingdom’s granting of asylum to political refugees from Russia and its refusal to extradite them as hostile actions. This in particular concerned Boris Berezovsky, an oligarch linked to political opposition circles, and Ahmad Zakayev, prime minister of the Chechen government in exile. On the other hand, the death in November 2006 of Alexander Litvinenko, a British citizen and a political refugee from Russia, who was poisoned with radioactive polonium, coupled with the Russian government’s refusal to surrender Andrei Lugovoy, a former officer of the Russian secret services, who was suspected of this crime, gave rise to a serious crisis in bilateral relations. One of the measures the British government took at that time was the decision to freeze co-operation between the two countries’ secret services.
What brought about an even stronger deterioration of relations between London and Moscow were economic problems, especially the British government’s de facto blocking of Gazprom’s attempts to expand into the lucrative British natural gas market in 2006–2007, and on the other hand problems encountered by British energy corporations on the Russian market. In 2007, the Russian-British joint venture, TNK-BP, was forced to make the decision to relinquish its project.

Attempts at a reset

The new British government, a coalition of Conservatives and Liberals, led by David Cameron made attempts to reset Russian-British relations in 2010. Cameron met four times with President Dmitry Medvedev at various international forums. In autumn 2010, in order to meet Russian expectations halfway for support with modernisation processes, the British side sent to Moscow a concept for establishing closer bilateral scientific and technological co-operation under the title «Knowledge Partnership». Russia reacted favourably to these initiatives, expecting however more serious economic offers from London. An opportunity for enhancing Russian-British relations in this area seemed to have been offered by the talks between BP and Rosneft, which in January 2011 resulted in an agreement being signed on strategic co-operation.

This agreement was formally blocked by the Russian partners in the TNK-BP joint venture, who demanded it be revised or that there be compensation from BP for breaching its obligations towards them. However, there are many hints indicating that their actions were closely consulted with the Russian government, which wanted to force BP to make further financial concessions. However, BP chose not to do this. It was also not without significance that the British government, without having expressed its official stance, was de facto critical of this deal.

Prime Minister Cameron’s visit

Given this background, the British prime minister’s visit to Moscow could not be expected to bring about any positive breakthrough in bilateral relations. Its most important result seems to have been the confirmation of the readiness of both sides to develop economic co-operation regardless of the existing political differences. An expression of that was the Declaration on a Knowledge-Based Partnership for Modernisation signed by Prime Minister Cameron and President Medvedev and the memorandums which accompanied it.

The visit did not settle the existing disputes between the United Kingdom and Russia. For example, both parties confirmed in public their respective firm stances on the extradition of Lugovoy. A great difference of opinions was also revealed in the approaches to the Syrian issue (while Prime Minister Cameron insisted that Assad’s regime should be removed from power as it had lost legitimacy, president Medvedev opposed the imposition of UN sanctions on Syria). The atmosphere of this visit was also affected by the searches of the Russian offices of BP in late August/early September, which was linked to the failure to reach a strategic agreement between BP and Rosneft.

A co-operation without reset?

One reason for the problem of making a reset in Russian-British relations seems to be the lack of readiness from the British side to pay the economic and political price which the Russian government expected to receive for it. Apparently, the unsuccessful BP-Rosneft deal seems to have played a major part in the prevention of a positive breakthrough in Russian-British relations (the discord over the Litvinenko case had a smaller impact). This is due to the fact that the potential benefits of closer relations seem limited to both parties. From the point of view of Russia, the United Kingdom, despite being one of the key EU member states, has a significantly weaker influence on the EU’s policy than Germany or France. It is also either unable or unready to offer Moscow attractive joint infrastructural projects, access to its domestic market or closer military co-operation. For the United Kingdom, Russia is an attractive market, including in the energy sector, however not sufficiently enough to be offered important British assets. London is interested in good political relations with Moscow, but it is not using these relations to improve its position within the EU and is also not ready to sacrifice its principles for their sake.

However, on the other hand, regardless of problems in bilateral relations on the political level, Russian-British relations in the area of trade and economy have been quite good over the past few years. Russia sees the potential benefits, the promised limited transfer of British technologies offers and wants British companies to make investments, especially in sectors other than energy. The Russian market, despite the existing difficulties, is still attractive for the United Kingdom and the many British companies operating on this market. All this will contribute to a continuation of economic relations between Russia and the United Kingdom, however without a particular rapprochement between the two countries.

14/09/2011, The Telegraph