Firestorm over Russia's orphans: Russia's parliament, the Duma, has
passed a bill in retaliation for an American law which targets
Russian
officials involved with human rights abuse. The trouble is, the Duma bill,
by prohibiting the adoption of Russians by Americans, clearly hurts
Russian orphans more than the Americans who wish to adopt
them.
Russia's Image
Smeared By Law Punishing Orphans (Kommersant, Russia)
"In 1985,
British singer Sting released a famous song called Русские[Russians]. It was an impassioned
plea to halt the Cold War between the Soviet Union and the United States. In it
he sang, 'I hope the Russians love their children too.' Back then,
the fact that the answer was 'yes' was taken for granted. Today, it
looks far less obvious. ... In America and Europe, people simply cannot fathom that the nation's parliament could invent and adopt anything like the so-called Dima Yakovlev Bill."
Sergei Magnitsky: His death in a Russian prison, after implicating top officials in a scheme to defraud the government, is widely regarded as a murder-cover-up in the West, and resulting in the U.S. Magnitsky Bill targeting Russian officials. Now Moscow has passed its own legislation in retaliation. The trouble is, the Dima
Yakovlev Bill, named after a Russian boy who choked to death after his adoptive U.S. dad forgot him in a car, hurts Russian orphans more than it does Americans.
In just days, an online
petition calling on Barack Obama to expand the 'Magnitsky list' to include Duma deputies who voted in support a ban on the adoption of
Russian children by Americans, has collected the required number of signatures. Kommersant analyst Konstantin Eggert
believes this has dealt a serious blow to Russia's international image.
In 1985, British singer Sting released a famous song called Русские[Russians]. It was an impassioned
plea to halt the Cold War between the Soviet Union and the United States. In it
he sang, "I hope the Russians love their children too." Back then,
the fact that the answer was "yes" was taken for granted. Today, it
looks far less obvious.
In America and Europe, people simply cannot fathom that the nation's
parliament - a parliament belonging to a "Big Eight" country (which,
I remind you, is a club of democracies) - could invent and adopt anything like
the so-called Dima
Yakovlev Bill. Imagine our government's ministers and deputy prime
ministers traveling the world, telling people that Russia is not the Soviet
Union, that our country has buried the legacy of the Cold War, and that one can
and should invest in the new Russia.
And then someone like Deputy Vyacheslav Nikonov, or, God forgive me, [Foreign
Affairs Committee Chairman] AlexeyPushkov, stands at the Duma
lectern and explains on camera for all the world to see how right it is to lock
Russian orphans and disabled children up in orphanages in retaliation against Uncle
Sam.
Posted
by Worldmeets.US
After that, foreign lawmakers, diplomats, non-governmental
organization, and even many businessmen, slid from their chairs in profound
shock. And as a result, many have concluded that comments by our ministers and
deputy prime ministers should be taken with skepticism, and that the real
Russia is an "other," something morally inferior, and even worse,
completely incomprehensible.
The only way to deal with people who punish their own
children out of spite, and at the same time cover up their own corruption, is
with apprehension and maximum caution. That is to say, by making sure to have a
return ticket out of Moscow with an open date.
For foreign companies, which spend millions on programs for corporate
responsibility in Russia, this is a very practical question. Who knows, maybe
tomorrow these overzealous lawmakers will bar them from aiding orphanages not to
tempt Russian childhood and adolescence with the alien Western values of
compassion and solidarity? Russia's ruling class believes this is a demonstration
of power and so-called pragmatism. But Russia's partners see in this bravado only
weakness, greed, and a total disregard for the interests of their own country.
