G8 ST. PETERSBURG NEWS AND DOCUMENTS
 

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Latest Global Partnership Highlights

"This will be the first time that Russia will chair this respected international forum. I hope that the experience we have accumulated since joining the G8 will ensure respect for tradition and consolidation of our efforts. Russia, as the presiding country, regards it as its duty to give a fresh impetus to efforts to find solutions to key international problems in energy, education and healthcare."            ~Address by Russian President Putin to visitors of the official site of Russia's G8 Presidency in 2006

The Palace of Congresses

Latest Global Partnership Highlights

Consortium Report-- Assessing the Global Partnership: From Kananaskis to St. Petersburg

July 2006

Global Partnership Scorecard 7/2006 ^*

Senator Nunn, Co-Chairman of the Nuclear Threat Initiative, statement at 7/13 Press Conference

Strategic Study on Bioterrorism: SIAA & IMEMO 7 / 2006

*2006 Global Partnership Scorecard: Reference Library

Official Links

G8 Saint Petersburg  2006: Russia's official summit website

G8 Statement on Nonproliferation

Report on G8 Global Partnership (Annex A)

Joint Statement by U.S. President George Bush and Russian Federation President V.V. Putin announcing the global initiative to combat nuclear terrorism

Global Initiative to Combat Nuclear Terrorism: Joint Fact Sheet

Joint Statement by President George Bush and President V.V.Putin  

NGO Links

PIR Center - Center for Policy Studies in Russia (Russian version)

CarnegieEndowment for International Peace Resources on the 2006 G8 Summit

Events

NTI Press Conference, Nobel Peace Center: "New Reports Call for G8 Summit Action on WMD Security; Deadly Threats Remain Worldwide, Despite Progress in Russia"in Washington D.C., July 13, 2006.

International Symposium, Nobel Peace Center: "Minimization of Highly Enriched Uranium in the Civil Nuclear Sector" in Oslo, Norway. June 17-20, 2006.

PIR Center Conference, "G8 Global Security Agenda: Challenges & Interests: Towards the St.-Petersburg Summit. April 20-22, 2006.

Media Coverage

July 13, 2006
Nuclear materials 'dangerously vulnerable'

Associated Press- Despite progress on security, tons of nuclear material are "dangerously vulnerable" to theft by terrorists across the globe, a private group contends. World leaders have failed to provide money promised for or pay strict attention to securing materials that could be used for a nuclear device or "dirty" bomb, the Nuclear Threat Initiative said Thursday. More.

July 11, 2006
Summit agreements to solve many urgent global problems – Russian foreign minister

Official G8 Website- "A large number of documents whose implementation will help solve many of humanity’s urgent problems have been prepared" for the G8 summit, said Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov when commenting on preparations for the summit in St. Petersburg on July 15-17. In an interview with the magazine Diplomat, he said that "a significant part of the G8 agenda is traditionally devoted to topical issues of global politics, such as non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, the fight against international terrorism, and settling escalating regional conflicts and crises." He added, "The Russian Foreign Ministry is responsible for this set of issues." More.

July 10, 2006
Russia's Moment at the Summit

CFR.Org Daily Analysis- Group of Eight (G8) summits are magnets for unwanted attention. Last year's conference of the world's richest democracies in Gleneagles, Scotland, where the primary focal points were climate change and poverty relief, got sidetracked after the terrorist bombings in London (Daily Telegraph). Right on cue, Russia inadvertantly finds itself with a major success to trumpet: The death of its most wanted terrorist (BBC), the Chechen militant Shamil Basayev. To be sure, this will bolster President Vladimir Putin's contention that Moscow's problems in Chechnya merely constitute an extension of the larger war on terrorism (FT).  More.

July 8, 2006
Koizumi to call G8 leaders to international cooperation on North Korea

Official G8 Website- Junichiro Koizumi, Japan's Prime Minister, will use the St. Petersburg G8 summit to call for international cooperation on North Korea's policies, in particular, its recent ballistic missiles launches, nuclear program and foreigners kidnapped by its security services. Koizumi expects the summit participants also to exchange opinions on other burning issues. President Vladimir Putin has proposed three leading agenda points: energy security, infectious diseases and education. The Japanese Prime Minister is also interested in discussing other global priorities. More.

July 5, 2006
Russia: Security Tightened at Leningrad Nuclera Plant Ahead of G8 Summit

Interfax- Security will be tightened in the town of Sosnovy Bor in Leningrad region, where the Leningrad Nuclear Power Plant is located, during the Group of Eight summit, the plant's press service reported. Additional organizational and security measures are being taken. Private vehicle traffic in the vicinity of the nuclearplant will be restricted during the summit, the press service said. More.

July 4, 2006
Russian presidential aide discusses plans for upcoming G8 summit

Interfax-AVN- Prikhodko said that while the issue of Iran's nuclear problem would rightly be discussed at the summit, it would not dominate proceedings, Interfax-AVN reported. "I don't think that this will be the central international theme. I don't think that all the efforts of the presidents and prime ministers will be focused solely on Iran: there are other issues," he said. "We have serious daily, sometimes hourly, discussions with our colleagues on this issue, not just with the G8 states, but also other countries. More.

June 30, 2006
Russia and the G8: Better Luck Next Year

The Financial Times- The headlines from the Group of Eight summit in St Petersburg in mid-July are likely to focus on whether the assembled leaders can induce Iran to halt its nuclear weapons programme. A muted, though no less important, question is whether the seven guests can persuade their host, Vladimir Putin, to reverse Russia's drift toward authoritarianism and thereby justify its continued membership in a group that supposedly consists of "major industrial democracies".  Back in 1998, leaders of what was then the G7 invited Boris Yeltsin to join their ranks. They hoped to encourage Russia to keep moving toward building a pluralistic political system, strengthening the rule of law, ensuring an independent judiciary and integrating with the global economy—principles that were written into joint statements. More.

June 26, 2006
G8 foreign ministers to discuss Iran

Official G8 Website- The G8 foreign ministers will meet June 29 to discuss Iran, terrorism, and drug trafficking, the Russian foreign minister said Monday at a government session attended by President Vladimir Putin. The meeting’s anti-terrorist agenda will include ways to deny terrorists access to nuclear materials. Experts are “looking into the proposal to set up an international nuclear services center,” Lavrov said. More.

June 15, 2006
Importance of Bush-Putin Meeting in Runup to G8 Summit Stressed - "So Help Us Bush"

Gazeta.ru- Vladimir Putin is going to meet with George Bush in the run-up to the G8 summit. According to Gazeta.Ru's information, the idea to hold a bilateral meeting came from the Kremlin. With his presence Bush is supposed to quench at least partially the wave of criticism of Russia raised by U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney. It is one month until the G8 summit in St. Petersburg. More.

June 10, 2006
G8 finance ministers committed to combating terrorist financing

Official G8 Website- The G8 finance ministers are committed to tightening up their countries' asset-freezing systems and promoting information exchanges to combat money laundering and terrorist financing, says the joint statement issued on the results of the ministerial meeting in St. Petersburg. "We confirm our determination to combat money laundering and terrorist financing, and we intend to build up our asset-freezing system and information exchanges, as well as to develop multilateral financial mechanisms to eradicate criminal and illegal activities," the statement says. More.

May 23, 2006

G8 leaders will not discuss Russian democracy at the summit - Shuvalov
G8 Official Website - Presidential aide Igor Shuvalov, the Russian G8 Sherpa, said Russia’s commitment to democratic ideals would not be discussed at the July G8 summit in St. Petersburg despite the generally negative attitude to Russia in the West. “I don’t think this issue will be raised,” he said Tuesday. “When G8 leaders talk with [President Vladimir] Putin, they understand what goals the Russian president is pursuing.” More.

April 28, 2006

A Summit Scant Remembered
The Moscow Times, Rose Gottemoeller - The world's attention, and deservedly so, has been focused this April on the 20th anniversary of the accident at Chernobyl, when a nuclear power reactor exploded in flames and contaminated an enormous swath of Ukraine, Belarus and Russia. Since 1986, the nuclear-power establishment in this part of the world has been dealing with the consequences of this disaster, and many brave men and women have lost their lives or their health in doing so. This April marks another anniversary worth noting, though: 10 years since the Group of Seven industrialized countries gathered in Moscow to discuss the safety and security of weapons-usable nuclear materials.   More.

April 21, 2006

G8 to address non-proliferation – deputy foreign minister
G8 2006 Summit Website - WMD non-proliferation will be "a priority topic at the G8 summit in St. Petersburg," said Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Kislyak. The Group of Eight is not a global government or a closed club, but it has a significant power and technical potential to control non-proliferation, he said.  More.

April 19, 2006

Russia's Long Journey to the G8 Presidency
The Moscow Times - More than a decade has passed since President Boris Yeltsin was first given a seat at the table of the Naples summit of the world's most powerful countries, yet the question of whether Russia deserves membership in the Group of Eight remains contentious. Even as Russia this year holds the rotating G8 presidency, its battle for credibility among the world's industrialized democracies is far from over. Especially since Russia's accession, the G8 has become more of a political organization than the grouping of economic powerhouses it began as. More.

April 12, 2006

PRESS CONFERENCE WITH STEPHEN RADEMAKER, ACTING ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF STATE FOR SECURITY AND NONPROLIFERATION ISSUES
Official Kremlin Int'l News Broadcast- [...] Rademaker: Good afternoon. I am in Moscow today for a series of meetings. Tomorrow I will be participating in a meeting hosted by the Foreign Ministry of the G-8 nonproliferation directors. And so, my counterparts from all of the G-8 members will be here for a day of discussions leading up to the St. Petersburg summit. Today I attended meetings at the Foreign Ministry with Anatoly Antonov, my Russian counterpart, and he and I had an extended discussion of the full range of bilateral arms control and nonproliferation issues that he and I handle. More.

April 11, 2005

Russia compiles international blacklist for export of military, dual use goods
BBC Monitoring Former Soviet Union - Political - Russia has compiled its first national list of foreign companies known to be involved in military programmes, nuclear and chemical industry and missile production, Deputy Prime Minister and Defence Minister Sergey Ivanov has said. At a Monday [10 April] meeting of President Vladimir Putin and the cabinet members, Ivanov said that the list relied on reports from the Foreign Ministry and intelligence, as well as information exchanges with leading nations related to the fight against the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.  More.

Papers and Other Publications

Summer 2006

The G8 Strelna Summit and Russia's National Power

Vladimir A. Orlov and Miriam Fugtugosh, The Washington Quarterly

April 21, 2006

"Linking Energy Security and Nuclear Security."

Holgate, Laura, Vice President for Russia and New Independent States Programs at the Nuclear Threat Initiative in Washington DC.

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April 21, 2006

Presentation on the G8 Global Security Agenda: Challenges and Interests. Towards the St. Petersburg Summit

Ludeking, Rudiger, Federal Foreign Office, Berlin.

April 21, 2006

Welcome Remarks for Plenary Session I or the PIR Center Conference on the Russian G8 Presidency. (Russian Version)

Spassiky, Nicolay, Deputy Secretary of the National Security Council of the Russian Federation.

April 21, 2006

The Russian CWD Programme: A UK Perspective

Wells, Brian, Director of Counter-Proliferation & Arms Control Directorate, Ministry of Defence, United Kingdom.