An open letter to President Obama from a number of Eastern European former heads of state and intellecutals was published yesterday in the Polish newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza. The signatories include former presidents Vaclav Havel and Lech Walesa and the editor of Foreign Policy's Bulgarian edition, Ivan Krastev. An exceprt:

 We welcome the "reset" of the American-Russian relations. As the countries living closest to Russia, obviously nobody has a greater interest in the development of the democracy in Russia and better relations between Moscow and the West than we do. But there is also nervousness in our capitals. We want to ensure that too narrow an understanding of Western interests does not lead to the wrong concessions to Russia. Today the concern is, for example, that the United States and the major European powers might embrace the Medvedev plan for a "Concert of Powers" to replace the continent's existing, value-based security structure. The danger is that Russia's creeping intimidation and influence-peddling in the region could over time lead to a de facto neutralization of the region. There are differing views within the region when it comes to Moscow's new policies. But there is a shared view that the full engagement of the United States is needed.

Many in the region are looking with hope to the Obama Administration to restore the Atlantic relationship as a moral compass for their domestic as well as foreign policies. A strong commitment to common liberal democratic values is essential to our countries. We know from our own historical experience the difference between when the United States stood up for its liberal democratic values and when it did not. Our region suffered when the United States succumbed to "realism" at Yalta. And it benefited when the United States used its power to fight for principle. That was critical during the Cold War and in opening the doors of NATO. Had a "realist" view prevailed in the early 1990s, we would not be in NATO today and the idea of a Europe whole, free, and at peace would be a distant dream.

We understand the heavy demands on your Administration and on U.S. foreign policy. It is not our intent to add to the list of problems you face. Rather, we want to help by being strong Atlanticist allies in a U.S.-European partnership that is a powerful force for good around the world. But we are not certain where our region will be in five or ten years time given the domestic and foreign policy uncertainties we face. We need to take the right steps now to ensure the strong relationship between the United States and Central and Eastern Europe over the past twenty years will endure.

You can read the whole thing at Radio Free Europe.

The worldwide recession has hit Russia's economy harder than most. The World Bank expects the economy to contract by almost 8 percent this year, its stock market has the dubious honor of being the first bear market since a worldwide stock rally in March. Now, the number of places to escape the doom and gloom is about to shrink significantly, as Russia plans to effectively shut down the entire casino industry on July 1.

The government is shutting down every last legal casino and slot-machine parlor across the land, under an antivice plan promoted by Vladimir V. Putin that just a few months ago was widely perceived as far-fetched. But the result will be hundreds of thousands of people thrown out of work.

And in a move that at times seems to have taken on almost farcical overtones, the Kremlin has offered the gambling industry only one option for survival: relocate to four regions in remote areas of Russia, as many as 4,000 miles from the capital. The potential marketing slogans — Come to the Las Vegas of Siberia! Have a Ball near the North Korean Border! — may not sound inviting, but that is in part what the government envisions.

All the same, none of the four regions are prepared for the transfer, and no casino is expected to reopen for several years. As of July 1, not even two decades after casinos began proliferating here in the free-for-all post-Soviet era, the industry’s workers will be out on the street.

“This is shaking my life to the core — such a blow for me and my family,” said Irina Mysachka, 32, a single mother who is a supervisor at the Shangri-La Casino in Moscow, which appears as orderly and preened (if your tastes run to fire-breathing neon dragons and other Oriental kitsch) as any similar luxury attraction in the United States.

“The authorities are taking this step without thinking at all,” she said. “They have not considered what this decision means for the workers. With the crisis, it is going to be very difficult for us."

The law behind the restrictions was introduced in late 2006, and there appear to be reasons both honest and not-so-honest behind it.

The gambling industry here does not have the loftiest of reputations, and many Russians will not grieve for it. Still, many of the 40 or so casinos in Moscow sought in recent years to behave more respectably, even as hundreds of slot-machine parlors retained a seedy, enter-at-your-own-risk feel[...]

The industry has been largely unregulated, and especially in recent years, almost anyone could get a license, for as little as $50. Russia is not a strait-laced place - rates of smoking and drinking are high - but an outcry about gambling ensued. "It is not only young people, but also retirees who lose their last kopecks and pensions through gambling," Mr. Putin said in 2006.

His plan was announced during a spy scandal between Russia and its neighbor Georgia, and the timing suggested that Mr. Putin was in part seeking to wound the Georgian diaspora here, which is said to have an influential role in the industry.

Shorter Russia: what happens in Moscow is Georgia's fault.

ALEXANDER NEMENOV/AFP/Getty Images

Dan Senor and Christian Whiton have an op-ed in today's Wall Street Journal with some suggestions for how the United States could effectively help the reformists in Iran. It's a tricky subject and creative thinking is certainly welcome (my colleague Chris Brose has weighed in on this), but Senor and Whiton's bold declaration that "Our own experience with dissidents around the world is that proof of concern by the U.S. government is helpful and desirable" worries me a bit, paritcularly in their choice of Ukraine's 2004 Orance Revolution as a model:

Mr. Obama should deliver another taped message to the Iranian people. Only this time he should acknowledge the fundamental reality that the regime lacks the consent of its people to govern, which therefore necessitates a channel to the "other Iran." He should make it clear that dissidents and their expatriate emissaries should tell us what they most need and want from the U.S. This could consist of financial resources, congresses of reformers, workshops or diplomatic gatherings. The key is to let the reformers call the shots and indicate how much and what U.S. assistance they want. Simply knowing we care, that we are willing to deploy resources and are watching their backs -- to the extent we can -- often helps reformers.

The 2004 Orange Revolution in Ukraine is a model. In that case the West joined Ukrainians in refusing to accept the results of a stolen election. This combined effort helped to force a final run-off vote that reflected the people's will. In Iran, this would mean not only redoing elections but also allowing a full field of candidates to run. As with Ukraine and the Soviet Union before, Mr. Obama could at least make it clear that the U.S. will separate the issues of engagement and legitimacy. Our engagement of the Soviet Union in arms-control talks did not prevent us from successfully pressing human-rights issues and seeking an alternative political structure. So it can be with Iran. Engagement without an effort to talk to the "other Iran" would not only be a travesty but tactically foolish as well.

Not every revolution is a "color" revolution. The visuals from Tehran may resemble Kiev in 2004, but the message from the streets is different. Both are nationalist movements in addition to democratic movements (as most successful democratic movements are) but Ukrainian and Iranian nationalism are very different beasts.

In Ukraine that nationalism could be directed against a government dominated by an outside power, Russia. The orange coalition (like the Polish Solidarity movement, which Senor and Whiton also cite) welcomed overt U.S. signs of support because it counteracted the support the pro-government forces were receiving from the Kremlin. The coalition billed itself as pro-Western.

In Iran, the protesters are crying allahu akbar from the rooftops and marching behind a fairly conservative hero of the 1979 revolution. They're protesting a probably rigged election, yes, but the nationalist rhetoric coming out of the movements leaders is not about rejoining the West but about protecting the Islamic state from Ahmadinejad's corrupt and bungling rule. 

On a more practical level, U.S. NGOs were involved in the run-up to the Ukrainian election, supporting poll monitoring and training activists so when the trouble started, they were in place to help out. This is certainly not the case in Iran.

This is not to say that a Mousavi presidency wouldn't be better for the United States, or that the U.S. government shouldn't be seeking out ways it can help (Evgeny Morozov has one novel idea) but it seems odd to assume that the young people marching in the streets of Tehran would welcome the outspoken support of the U.S. president just because other young people marching in other streets have welcomed it in the past. 

AFP/Getty Images 

From RIA-Novosti:

The Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) will conduct joint military exercises in August-September in Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus, the Belarusian defense minister said on Wednesday.

The defense ministers of the post-Soviet security bloc comprising Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan held a regular meeting in Moscow on June 3.

"The joint drills will be held in Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus to practice the deployment of CSTO's joint rapid-reaction force," Leonid Maltsev told reporters after the meeting.

He said the exercises in Belarus will also involve the Russia-Belarus joint military grouping created within the framework of the CSTO.

According to media reports, Russia is planning to build a strong military contingent in Central Asia within the CSTO comparable to NATO forces in Europe.

Russia was highly irritated by 19-country NATO war games held in Georgia last month. Interestingly, Kazakhstan, where part the CSTO drills are to take place, was one of the countries invited to participate in the NATO exercises but declined in solidarity with Russia.

The exercises in Belarus, right on NATO's eastern border, are likely to be seen as a response to NATO's actions in Georgia.

Reading about Joe Biden's address to the Bosnian parliament yesterday, his remarks seems unusually blunt, bordering on disrespectful:

"Today, to be very blunt with you, I personally, and the leadership of my country is worried ... about the direction of your country and your future." ...

"The only real future is to join Europe," Biden said. "Right now you are off that path. You can follow this path to Europe or you can take an alternative path. You have done it before," Biden said, referring to the 1992-95 war.

"Failure to do so will ensure you remain among the poorest countries in Europe. At worst, you'll descend into ethnic chaos that defined your country for the better part of a decade."

Despite Russian annoyance, NATO is conducting military exercises in Georgia today. But not all states that are elligible to participate are taking part. As Stratfor notes in its (annoyingly gated but possible to get for free) analysis, Armenia, Kazakhstan, Moldova, Serbia, Estonia and Latvia are all staying out of the drills. The first four countries all have good relations with Russia and aren't that surprising, but Estonia and Latvia have tradionally relished a good chance to thumb their noses at Moscow. What gives?

Stratfor says it's a sign of the times:

Estonia and Latvia have been severely affected by the ongoing economic crisis, with both countries facing double-digit drops in gross domestic product forecast for 2009 (-10.1 percent and -13.1 percent, respectively) as a result of foreign capital flight and exports that are in free fall. Extreme social tension has set in as a result of the harsh economic realities, with both countries witnessing violent protests in January. In the meantime, the Latvian government collapsed early in 2009, and Riga has had to take out a $2.4 billion loan from the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Estonia’s government is set to face a vote of no confidence this week, and a similar loan from the IMF is likely later in 2009.

These conditions have caused Estonia and Latvia to temper their aggressive stance toward Russia. While the two countries are typically vocal and eager to take advantage of Russia’s weaknesses for media attention, they are now backing down as they realize their own positions are weak while Russia’s position is growing stronger. This explains Estonia’s and Latvia’s withdrawal from the NATO exercises, as they realize that their participation would be far more damaging to their relationship with Russia and that their financial situations would make joining in on the drills even more difficult. For these two countries, showing solidarity and support for Georgia makes a great deal of sense in theory (i.e., supporting in principal Georgia’s struggle against Russian influence). But it becomes increasingly hard to justify in practice when Russian influence is being felt in a real sense on their home turf.

As FP's own Evgeny Morozov wrote in Newsweek recently, Estonia has also toned down its cyberwarfare rhetoric directed at Russia.  Real rapprochement between the Baltics and Russia is probably still a ways off, but this is an interesting development to watch.

(Hat tip: Johnson's Russia List)

Ukraine says its security service says it caught three persons attempting to sell radioactive material, which they said was plutonium-239, for $10 million. A government spokesperson said the material could possibly have been used in a "dirty-bomb" attack, and that it was of Soviet origin.

Relatedly -- Jeffrey Lewis and Meri Lugo discuss the draw-down of nuclear weaponry in an excellent FP Argument post today. 

Gathering over 50 percent of the vote, Moldova's Communist Party (PCRM) won a landslide victory in the parliamentary elections on Sunday. Interestingly, until this election Moldova was the only state in Europe where clinging to the Communist brand remained politically expedient. In fact, since Moldova declared independence in 1990 the PCRM has never relinquished power. However, today's violent protests have shown that over the last decade a socio-political chasm between young and urban voters and the elderly and rural has split Moldovan society.

It's important to note that the PCRM's platform, based on such Marxist notions as encouraging entrepreneurship, attracting foreign direct investment, and protecting human rights, isn't really all that Communist. Unlike other nominally Communist parties, the PCRM doesn't even pay lip service to Communist principles and openly advocates seeking closer socio-economic relations with Europe. Their key difference with the Liberals is that the Communists are wary of reunification with Romania, a country with which Moldova shares historical and linguistic ties

The wide margin of victory provides the PCRM with a clear mandate to pursue its proposed policy of closer integration with Europe, but as Moldova expert Elizabeth Anderson pointed out, its many years in power has left the Communist Party over-institutionalized and corrupt. The next Moldovan president will have to tread lightly, institute reforms within his own party, and try to build coalitions with the minority parties in parliament. Otherwise, Moldova risks falling into the same kind of vicious cycle that neighboring Ukraine has experienced since the Orange revolution in 2004.

The financial crisis seems to be boosting extreme nationalist sentiment in Ukraine:

On March 15, voters in the Ternopil region of western Ukraine elected a new regional assembly. This was an Orange Revolution bastion, a region that has long sought to embrace the West and shun Russia.

But it is also has Ukraine's highest unemployment. In a crowded field, the previously little-known Freedom Party won 50 of the regional assembly's 120 seats as voters embraced its hard Right leader, Oleg Tyagnibok, who has urged the expulsion of all Jews and Russians from Ukraine.

"The problem is less the popularity of the nationalists than the universal disappointment with mainstream parties," said Viktor Chumak, a political scientist in Ukraine's capital, Kiev. "Voters are sympathising with radicals more and more as a result of the crisis."

I'm actually surprised we haven't seen more of this around the world yet. 

If, as is looking more likely, the Obama administration moves to delay or cancel the deployment of a missile defense shield in Eastern Europe, one possible diplomatic downside could be the effect on U.S. relations with Poland and the Czech Republic, the two countries that signed agreements with the Bush administrations to host parts of the shield. On a visit to Washington, Poland's Foreign Minister seemed to give Obama a bit of an out on this issue:

“What we would like to be honored is what went along with” the missile-defense system, [Radoslaw] Sikorski, 46, said in an interview yesterday during a visit to Washington that included a meeting with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. “We paid quite a political price for the agreement, both in terms of internal politics and in our relations with Russia.” 

State Department political director William Burns has also indicated that missile defense might be one area where the administration is willing to compromise with Russia and will certainly be on the agenda when Hillary Clinton meets her Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov next week. The administration might feel a more productive relationship with Russia is worth some damage to its image in Eastern Europe, but it would be nice if they didn't have to make the choice.

DOMINIQUE FAGET/AFP/Getty Images

Despite ratifying the Lisbon Treaty this week, the Czech Republic seems hell-bent on offending the European Union as much as possible while it holds the organization's rotating presidency. First it was that sculpture, then yesterday, Czech President Vaclav Klaus -- an outspoken Euroskeptic -- spoke to the European parliament and compared them to a communist dicatorship:

"Here, only one single alternative is being promoted and those who dare thinking about a different option are labelled as enemies of European integration. Not so long ago, in our part of Europe we lived in a political system that permitted no alternatives."

A number of MEPs walked out in a huff.

Say what you will about Klaus, the guy's not afraid to speak his mind. Jiri Pehe wrote about his unconventional views on global warming in the May/June issue of FP. (Hint: He compares environmentalists to communists too.)

JOHN THYS/AFP/Getty Images

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez reportedly told an interviewer that former Polish President, Solidarity leader, and Nobel Peace Prize winner Lech Walesa has been banned from entering the country to speak to a student opposition group:

Chavez instructed authorities on Tuesday to ensure that Walesa does not enter Venezuela, which is preparing for a Feb. 15 referendum on a proposal to lift term limits for all elected officials.

Chavez made the comment after an interviewer suggested that Walesa had received a new invitation.

Granted, Walesa has turned into a bit of a blowhard in recent years, (a Polish friend once told me that he can only stand to read Walesa speeches after they've been translated into English) but the role he played in Eastern Europe's struggle for democracy is legendary. Chavez just put himself in some pretty bad company by denying him the right to speak.

Photo: JANEK SKARZYNSKI/AFP/Getty Images

The inauguration of Barack Obama wasn't just the event of the day in the United States. It received above-the-fold coverage in countries all over the globe, as Jan. 21's front page of the United Daily News in Taipei, Taiwan, above, shows. To see more Obama-blaring newspaper front pages from Namibia to Israel to Poland and more, check out this week's photo essay, "The Inauguration Heard 'Round the World," which features images obtained from the Newseum.

The Czech Republic, having only taken over the rotating European Union presidency in January, has already managed to offend its EU peers with a sculpture it installed in the atrium of the European Council headquarters in Brussels. Titled "Entropa," the sculpture makes light of European national stereotypes:

[C]ountries digested depictions of their national character as a Dracula-inspired theme park (Romania), a rudimentary toilet (Bulgaria) or a flooded land with minarets poking through (the Netherlands)...

Other national depictions in ”Entropa” include Luxembourg as a lump of gold on sale to the highest bidder, France emblazoned with the word ”Greve” (”strike”), Denmark made of Lego, and Sweden lying within an Ikea flatpack. Britain is simply missing – supposedly a reference to its deep Euroscepticism.

Worse still, the piece turns out to be an eleaborate prank. It was not the work of artists from all 27 EU member states, as had been claimed, but was created by a single Czech artist, David Cerny. (You probably want to make sure your speakers are turned off if you click on that link at work.) The Czech government has been forced to make a public apology.

Arguably, the Eurocrats should have known what they were getting into. As anyone who's read Kafka or seen a Jan Svankmajer movie can attest, Czech culture has always had a somewhat dark, surrealist edge to it. This is, after all, a country that elected an absurdist playwright as its first post-communist president. I reported on the country's strange obsession with Frank Zappa for Radio Prague in 2004. The documentary, Czech Dream, a feature-length prank in which hundreds of real Prague residents were tricked into attending a fake supermarket opening in an empty field, is another good example.

So while Cerny's sculpture might not be great diplomacy, I like that a bit of classic Czech weirdness has been injected into one of the world's stuffier organizations.

(Hat tip: Passport reader Aaron Lovell)

Update: Cerny responds to the controversy:

Grotesque hyperbole and mystification belongs among the trademarks of Czech culture and creating false identities is one of the strategies of contemporary art.  The images of individual parts of Entropa use artistic techniques often characterised by provocation. The piece thus also lampoons the socially activist art that balances on  the verge between would-be controversial attacks on national character and undisturbing decoration of an official space. We believe that the environment of Brussels is capable of  ironic self-reflection, we believe in the sense of humour of European nations and their representatives.

That belief was clearly mistaken.

Photo: DOMINIQUE FAGET/AFP/Getty Images