By Peter Lukimson, exclusively to VK
A group of Russian senators has visited Israel this week. The working visit was held in the framework of the continuous bilateral strategic dialogue established by the two governments in late 2010.
The Russian MPs held meetings with their Knesset colleagues from the foreign policy committee and met with Ministers Avigdor Liebermann, Moshe Ayalon and Dan Meridor, as well as with the head of the National Security Council, Yakov Amidror. To sum up the visit, a press-conference for Russian-speaking journalists was organized by the Knesset. The following questions were posed to the head of the Russian delegation, Mikhail Margelov:
- Should Israel be concerned about the possibility of Russia increasing weapons' shipments to the new regimes that appeared after the ‘Arab spring’?
- Russia has always dealt with weapons’ exports with complete responsibility. We never deliver weapons to states that are under international sanctions. You know that we made the decision to stop our anti-missile systems shipments to Iran; we were the first to pose the problem of illegal Libyan weapons trafficking in the sub-Saharan region at the UN Security Council. As far as we know, you also suffer from this illegal trafficking – Libyan weapons are being smuggled into the Gaza Strip via Sinai. So you shouldn’t think that Russia cares only about selling weapons to the new democratic governments of the region. We have another priority – reorganization and modernization of our own army, so our weapons industry works mostly for the internal market. Our cooperation with Israel is very important to us in this regard. We buy Israeli drones, we have close cooperation in the field of state security, and we hope to promote it, especially in the high-tech spheres. So there are not as many disagreements here between our governments as it may seem.
- But does Russia always take account of the specific character of the Middle East when exporting weaponry? For example, there were talks of Russia intending to sell the ‘Iskander’ missile system with a range of 400 km (so it doesn’t fall under certain international restrictions) to Syria recently. But for Israel, 400 km is the whole territory of the state. As for Iran – Putin says that a nuclear Iran would be a great problem for the whole world, but at the same time Russia vetoes international sanctions against Iran. So where’s the logic to it?
- First of all, the ‘Iskander’ wasn’t delivered to Syria – because we do take the specifics of the region into account and don’t want to feed flames. As for our logic considering Iranian affairs, we proceed from the fact that Iran is our neighbor. We do all we can to prevent Teheran from having military nuclear capabilities, but we won’t hamper the country’s peaceful development of the energy sector. We may disagree with our western partners on the ways of resolving the Iranian problem. But we have had experience of international sanctions – against ex-Yugoslavia. I don’t think that UN sanctions are in any way efficient, they only help certain people make profits. There are no actual examples of sanctions bringing results, so I think we need to look for some other ways.
- And what are the criteria of effectiveness in Russia’s opinion?
- First of all, the sanctions should target governments opposing the international community, not the general population of a state. But the issue of sanctions is still open; we are ready to discuss it.
- Are the government and the parliament working in tandem effective for developing a foreign policy? Sometimes the government takes certain steps disapproved by a number of MPs. Could this resistance of the MPs be effective in any way?
- Our state is a Presidential Republic; the last word on issues of our foreign policy belongs to the President. But this doesn’t mean that MPs and senators have no say here. The government takes our opinion into account and this opinion affects the President’s final decision. Sometimes the public demands radical decisions, but I’m not a partisan of such an approach. The world is changing so rapidly that any two given countries should try to preserve existing dialogue. We look forward to a return visit of Israeli diplomats to Moscow."
In the framework of their visit, the Russian senators also met with the chairman of the Knesset foreign affairs committee, Shaul Mofaz. This meeting had a complicated character, as Mofaz made serious reproofs to his guests: “We are surprised by the position Russia has taken concerning the recent developments on the Middle East. I would like you to inform your government that Israel sees Russian support for the arms race in the region and to the Iranian nuclear project in particular in quite a negative light. You should understand that helping Iran is helping the ‘axis of evil’. The attitude of Russia towards the massacre of the Syrian people started by Bashar Assad also escapes our understanding. We expect Russia to take up a clear and unambiguous position towards the crimes of Assad’s regime. And if Moscow isn’t intent on using its influence to reinforce Israel’s security, it shouldn’t complain when Israel reinforces its security by the means we see fit.
Such a harsh tone surprised Mikhail Margelov, but in general the meeting’s atmosphere wasn’t so bad. The same claims were addressed to Russian diplomats by Knesset chairman Rubi Rivlin, who said that he has no doubt that Russia has the power to stop Iran’s nuclear arms race.” There is no single sheriff in our world. There are two of them: the US and Russia. And the responsibility for global security lies with you both”.
