Among other achievements of the year 2011 one should mention the increased attention paid by the government to the geographical component of the country’s geopolitics. In particular, Russian PM Vladimir Putin, who is also the head of the board of guardians of the Russian Geographical Society (RGS), and Emergency Situations Minister Sergey Shoigu, the director of the RGS, awarded a grant to the project of a documentary ‘Pomors’ (Pomors are Russian settlers and their descendants on the White Sea coast). One of the project’s authors, program director of the ‘Mayak’ radio station, Georgiy Saralidze, told VK about the project.
- Georgiy, please tell us about the ‘Pomors’ project.
- It is part of the ‘Happy People’ series. This is a series of documentaries about different ethnic groups who chose to hold on to the traditions of their ancestors in our troubled times. The first four documentaries tell the story of Siberian peoples and they were awarded a number of prestigious Russian and international prizes. The famous German film director Werner Herzog participated in their creation.
In April 2011 Russian PM Vladimir Putin, who is also the head of the board of guardians of the Russian Geographical Society, awarded the creators of the series a grant so we could continue their project. Right now we are finishing a two-episode film about the Pomors – the descendants of Russian settlers on the White Sea coast – and about the severe yet beautiful nature of this region.
- Do you believe that making such ‘small good deeds’ like these films, equally interesting for people from all CIS countries, could help restore our brotherly relations – the idea promoted in the Eurasian Union project?
- I have always been convinced that the ‘small good deeds’ policy is the only way to reach harmony in a country’s national policy. Common hobbies and individual interests can unite people, even when relations between their governments are not at their best: for example, I was a producer of a TV-show called ‘Dialogues on Fishing’, and I remember that our program was watched in Georgia even at the roughest points of our countries’ relations.
As for the ‘Happy People’ project, yes, of course it has a social goal: it is supposed to show that people of different ethnicities who live in harmony with themselves and their environment can be happy in the same way. Despite all their differences they have much more in common as far as their values and moral principles are concerned.
- You have been collaborating with ‘Vestnik Kavkaza’ for a long time now. What does this partnership give you? And what do you think is the significance of such pan-Caucasian projects as ours?
- I think we’ve always lacked a site where the most acute Caucasus-related problems would be discussed objectively and professionally, without extremism. In my opinion, today ‘VK’ is the best media-source on the Caucasus.
Russia catastrophically lacks objective information on the developments in the Caucasus. And when incompetent journalists try to shed light on the problems of the Caucasus, it makes them even worse. That is why ‘VK’ is such a good source of information – its authors are perfectly competent.
I hope that we will be able to achieve an even higher level of competence, and our projects will be supported by public organizations and the government.
Interview by Ekaterina Tesemnikova, exclusively to VK
