Russia to have 5-6 aircraft carriers in Northern, Pacific Fleets

Russia will create 5-6 aircraft carrier groups in the Northern and Pacific Fleets, the Navy commander said on Sunday.

Admiral Vladimir Vysotsky said the Navy command had decided to build sea-borne aircraft carrier systems for these fleets instead of simply aircraft carriers.

“Everything must work in a system, including aircraft carriers. We have called them sea-borne aircraft carrier systems, which will be based in the Northern and Pacific Fleets. The construction of such systems will begin after 2012,” Vysotsky said before reviewing a military parade on the occasion of Navy Day in Russia.

DPNI will respectable imago

The ultranationalist Movement Against Illegal Immigration, or DPNI, intends to abandon radical action and join politics, its leader, Alexander Belov, told the organization’s congress.

The organization plans to become a European-style nationalist party, Kommersant reported Monday.

“We are interested in nationalism as a respectable movement. Not with beards and jackboots, but suits and ties,” he said, Kommersant reported.

Russia’s new Great Game

Employing strategies redolent of a new Great Game, Russia has stepped up its diplomatic and trade activities in the Middle East and North Africa in a bid to enhance its geopolitical clout and gain access to, and at least partial control over, the region’s oil and gas reserves.

Among the former global superpower’s tactics: linking arms deals and debt-forgiveness to energy deals.

The strategy has been most apparent in former client states of the Soviet Union including Libya, Iraq and Syria, although by no means limited to such countries. Moreover, Moscow has not shied away from courting the authoritarian regimes of countries such as Iran, Syria and Libya that are or have been shunned by the US and other western governments.
Russia is among the world’s biggest holders of oil and gas reserves, and is also a top global producer and exporter of both commodities, yet some of its biggest oil and gas producers have been seeking, with government backing, to expand their operations abroad.