PUBLIC CHAMBER GETS INTO GEAR

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 MOSCOW 004180

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 03/03/2016
TAGS: PGOV PREL PINR RS
SUBJECT: PUBLIC CHAMBER GETS INTO GEAR

REF: A. MOSCOW 922

B. MOSCOW 1082

Classified By: Ambassador William J. Burns. Reasons: 1.4 (B/D).


1. (C) SUMMARY. In the three months since its inaugural
plenary, the Public Chamber has displayed a flurry of
activity. Its many commissions, sub-commissions and working
groups have begun a busy schedule of meetings on a broad
range of issues. Early tensions with the State Duma and
other bodies have been resolved, or at least put aside.
Chamber members with whom we spoke remain uncertain that the
Chamber will ultimately have much impact, but they professed
commitments to trying to use it to affect change. Lawyer
Genri Reznik, one of its most independent members, recently
told the Ambassador that the Chamber could play a positive
role in promoting legal reform, but added that if the body
proved to be nothing but a rubber-stamp, he and like-minded
members would walk away. We remain skeptical of the
Chamber's overall impact but are exploring opportunities to
influence specific policies and help shape elite attitudes.
END SUMMARY.
.
Chamber Swings into Action
--------------


2. (C) After a shaky start in the immediate aftermath of its
first formal meeting on January 22 (ref A),Russia's Public
Chamber has swung into gear. Perhaps its most visible
initial attempt to establish its credibility came when it
investigated the Chelyabinsk hazing incident (ref B). The
press widely covered Chamber Commission on Public Control
over Law Enforcement Activities Chair Anatoliy Kucherena's
trips to Chelyabinsk and meetings with key players in that
incident. Most observers agree that the investigation raised
the Chamber's profile and marginally improved its public
image.


3. (C) Particularly in the period since then, the Chamber's
seventeen commissions and the many recently formed
sub-commissions and working groups have met regularly and
frequently. Their focus has run the gamut from issues of
high policy -- including some major foreign policy issues
being addressed by the Commission on Foreign Cooperation and
Public Diplomacy, chaired by political analyst Vyacheslav
Nikonov -- to more narrow concerns, such as one commission's
April 12 session to discuss the quality of music education in
Russia. Setting out an ambitious agenda that includes
improving Russia's image abroad and working with foreign NGOs
operating in Moscow, Nikonov has told us he will organize
meetings under the umbrella of the Chamber with foreign
experts on international affairs. It had already co-hosted
(with Gleb Pavlovskiy's Center for Effective Politics) an
experts meeting with the Nixon Center, and had also hosted a
meeting a meeting of experts from Shanghai Cooperation
Organization countries. He noted that the Chamber plenary
has usefully highlighted the issue of tolerance in the face
of repeated attacks on ethnic minorities, and he predicted
the Chamber would also look at the controversial Baikal
pipeline issue.


4. (SBU) Among the bodies formed within the Chamber has been
an "expert analytical group" that will work on citizens'
electoral rights. Created at the initiative of the Free
Elections Foundation, the analytical group includes a range
of experts including Golos head Liliya Shibanova. While
continuing to work with Golos, the Embassy's USAID mission
has begun exploring the possibility to working with the newly
formed organization.


5. (C) Several members have told us they are more busy with
Chamber work than they had expected. Russian Union of Youth
Chairman Oleg Rozhnov said the pace of Chamber work is making
it hard to keep up with his other responsibilities. We heard
from terrorism expert Aleksandr Ignatenko that the Commission
on Development of Civil Society and Public Assistance to
National Projects, of which he is deputy chair, had received
a flood of proposals, and dealing with them was proving a
huge challenge. The Chamber's small staff of ninety people
was not proving sufficient, Ignatenko said, and while the
Chamber could call in many experts, doing so required more
time and organizational capacity than he had at his disposal.
Nikonov also commented on what he regarded as a largely
"useless" staff that showed more initial interest in the
perquisites of office than in supporting Chamber activities.


6. (C) Even before the Chamber formally began its work,
evidence emerged that it had evoked unhappiness from the
State Duma, which saw the new body as challenging its
legislative responsibilities. In that context, many
observers believed that Chamber members' attempts to
forestall passage of the controversial NGO law until the

MOSCOW 00004180 002 OF 003


Chamber, ostensibly representing civil society views, could
fully consider it reflected a struggle between the two
bodies. After paying lip service to Chamber input, the Duma
passed the legislation and President Putin signed it before
the Chamber's first plenary session. Subsequently, the Duma
sought to limit Chamber members' ability to enter the Duma
building and to attend Duma sessions. By some accounts, the
Kremlin was forced to step in and broker a compromise to end
the embarrassing controversy, which drew media attention. At
the time, Ignatenko confirmed to us that the controversy was
real, with Duma members seeing the Chamber as a threat to its
authority. He added, however, that other bodies also felt
threatened, claiming that Presidential Commission on Civil
Society chair Ella Pamfilova was extremely unhappy with the
Chamber, both because it threatened her Commission's
responsibilities and because she had hoped to be appointed as
its head.


7. (C) By all appearances, the Chamber's disputes with the
Duma and other bodies have at least been put aside. In a
recent interview, Chamber Secretary Yevgeniy Velikhov
described relations between the two bodies as good, and the
Duma and Chamber have begun holding joint meetings.
Similarly, on April 12 the Chamber held a joint meeting with
Prime Minister Fradkov and other government figures at which
it was agreed that the Chamber would monitor implementation
of the national priority projects ,provide feedback on the
public's views, and keep a lookout for bureaucratic
hindrances that it could publicize and thus help overcome.


8. (C) That Velikhov heads the Chamber is itself cause for
encouragement. A widely respected figure, he has long worked
closely with the Embassy on a range of issues. Among those
has been his active role in promoting the USAID-funded Junior
Achievement Russia (JAR) program. Most recently, Velikhov
proposed to the Ambassador that JAR be showcased as a
positive example of how foreign-funded NGOs help Russia, and
he suggested a Junior Achievement-related event as part of
the Russian G-8 Presidency to highlight business-oriented
youth in all the G-8 countries and Africa. Velikhov has
volunteered to put the Embassy in touch with various Chamber
commission chairs with an eye to finding areas of
cooperation. Nikonov told us he will accompany Velikhov on a
visit to Washington in mid-May to an academic conference, and
they will be interested in meetings in Congress and with
Administration officials.
.
ANY REAL IMPACT?
--------------


9. (C) Though the Chamber is now in motion, its members
continue to have mixed views about whether it will have any
real impact. Protestant Bishop Sergey Ryakhovskiy has noted
to us that he will be closely involved with the Chamber's
effort to monitor implementation of the NGO legislation, and
he told us April 14 that he was encouraged by that day's
discussion of xenophobia issues at a Chamber plenary. He
acknowledged, however, that the Kremlin would continue to
oversee the Chamber's workings and might not allow an
independent analysis of whether NGOs were being treated
fairly once the new legislation goes into effect.
Nonetheless, Ryakhovskiy has insisted that he aims to make
the most of the opportunity.


10. (C) In a recent meeting with the Ambassador, lawyer
Genri Reznik, widely considered one of the Chamber's most
independent members, made the same point about trying to use
the Chamber to promote positive change. Noting that the
Chamber had been formed to represent civil society, Reznik
insisted that he became a member to represent his own views,
which are shared by only a limited part of the Russian
public. He intended to use the Chamber to support Putin on
some issues, such as economic reform, while criticizing him
on others.


11. (C) Reznik said he aimed to use the Chamber primarily to
promote judicial reform. Corruption remained a serious
problem in the judiciary, Reznik continued, being
particularly rampant in the Arbitration Court. Ensuring that
all court decisions are made readily available on the
Internet would be one way to foster transparency, and the
Chamber should encourage that effort. The media could also
play an important role by reporting on corrupt judges, Reznik
continued, pointing to a weekly column recently initiated in
the Vedemosti newspaper to report on cases where the court
ruled in favor of individuals and against large corporations
or government bureaucrats. The Chamber could encourage other
publications to replicate that initiative. The Procuracy's
practice of undertaking a general investigation (obshchiy
nadzor) of a company without objective reasons to suspect
wrongdoing helped foster corruption, and the Chamber, working
with the business sector, would study ways of ending that

MOSCOW 00004180 003.2 OF 003


practice. Most of Russia's judges hail from the ranks of
prosecutors and law enforcers and are not progressives,
Reznik added; he planned to use the Chamber to look for ways
of get more defense attorneys appointed as judges.


12. (C) While hopeful that the Chamber could make progress
on those fronts, Reznik was uncertain about the prospects.
He noted, however, that the Chamber's members included a
significant number of honest and well-meaning people. If
such people found the Chamber to be a rubber stamp, he
insisted, they would quit rather than ruin their own
reputations.
.
THE VIEW OF SKEPTICS
--------------


13. (C) Many independent civil society activists are far
more skeptical than Reznik. Acknowledging that the Chamber
has members -- Reznik is usually mentioned -- who are
genuinely independent, the skeptics fear that such people
will not be able to have any positive impact and will quickly
be co-opted.


14. (C) Not all believe the Chamber should be written off,
however, Union of Right Forces (SPS) leader Leonid Gozman
told us recently that with the Kremlin having fully
discredited all other institutions of government, the Chamber
deserved a chance. For the moment, it was "Putin's
plaything," and its small group of independent members might
find some leeway to achieve progress, albeit on less
controversial issues. With that in mind, SPS had submitted
military reform proposals to the Chamber in the belief that
doing so could do no harm and might even result in some
progress.
.
COMMENT
--------------


15. (C) The Chamber is now out on the track and running, but
its members may tire of their active schedule if they
conclude it amounts to little more than a "talk shop." If
that is a broader public perception, the Kremlin may also
lose its enthusiasm for the body. Despite current claims
that the Chamber's role complements that of the Duma and
other bodies, it may come to be seen as redundant.
Nonetheless, once created, institutions often prove hard to
dismantle -- for instance, many observers believe the
Presidential Representatives (PolPreds) have lost whatever
purpose that innovation may once have had, but it is now hard
to eliminate. Even if it shows little in the way of results,
the Public Chamber might similarly linger on. It has
already, however, become a political tool, as in its
investigation and publicizing of the hazing scandal (where
Defense Minister Sergey Ivanov was seen by some to be an
implicit target of its activities),and could potentially be
used to attack or support other political figures as well.


16. (C) We share the skepticism about the Chamber's
long-term viability, recognizing that the Kremlin will be
watching closely and will try to ensure that Chamber
activities and views do not become "too independent." While
a small group of independent civil society activists were
included as Chamber members, most members hew to the Putin
administration's line and are unlikely under normal
circumstances to challenge Kremlin policy. Nonetheless,
independent voices have already sometimes emerged from the
Chamber, and its many structures offer new opportunities to
seek partners for initiatives, particularly politically
non-controversial ones. Velikhov, the Chamber's head, and
other leading figures have expressed interest in working with
us on projects, and we are actively pursuing those
opportunities.
BURNS