VZCZCXRO6607
RR RUEHDBU RUEHLN RUEHPOD RUEHSK RUEHVK RUEHYG
DE RUEHMO #2559/01 2821146
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
R 091146Z OCT 09
FM AMEMBASSY MOSCOW
TO RUCNCIS/CIS COLLECTIVE
RUEHXD/MOSCOW POLITICAL COLLECTIVE
RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 5053

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 MOSCOW 002559 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PREL PGOV PHUM KDEM RS
SUBJECT: TOMSK: ANN ARBOR ON THE STEPPE - BUT CYNICISM 
REIGNS 
 
REF: MOSCOW 775 
 
¶1. (SBU) Summary: As a university town and a former SPS 
bastion, Tomsk has a small but stable liberal electorate, and 
shows greater press freedom and tolerance for foreigners than 
many other regions in Russia.  This press freedom has had 
little influence on local politics; most articles exposing 
local corruption are ignored, widespread cynicism holds sway 
among Tomsk's youth, and United Russia maintains its thorough 
if tenuous grip on power.  Conversations with liberal 
oppositionists and government officials in Tomsk revealed an 
undercurrent of elite support for Medvedev's expressed ideas 
on top-down reform and increased democratization, which may 
lead people in this city to discard their cynicism and follow 
him if he can turn his soaring rhetoric into a concrete 
program of systemic change.  End Summary. 
 
A liberal oasis? 
---------------- 
 
¶2. (SBU) As the home to Tomsk State University, Tomsk swells 
annually with an additional student population of 25,000. 
Its "university town" atmosphere, along with a history of 
innovation and the legacy of dissidents and their children 
who lived in Siberia, provide liberal underpinnings to the 
city.  Aleksandr Krasnoperov, who writes for the state-owned 
daily Tomskiye Novosti, told us during an October 1-2 visit 
that Tomsk was formerly a bastion of the liberal party Union 
of Right Forces (SPS), who won 9 percent and received two 
deputies in the last Duma elections here.  Many former SPS 
members work there, including Right Cause deputy and local 
Executive Committee chief Nikolay Salangin, who told us that 
he still carried the liberal torch to the extent possible 
(though Krasnoperov called Right Cause's work "useless"). 
Salangin estimated that Tomsk has a "very stable" liberal 
electorate of 10-15 percent, or slightly higher.  "In 
Communist times, it was more free than Moscow," Salangin 
said.  "People form liberal ideas out here."  He admonished 
us to "forget the stereotype" of liberal big cities versus 
conservative provinces. 
 
¶3. (SBU) Offering some examples, Salangin said there is less 
"telephone justice" in Tomsk than in other parts of the 
country, as the Judicial faculty in the university exerts a 
positive influence on local judges.  Salangin has a close 
friend who is a prosecutor, who he said is sincerely trying 
to do his job.  Tomsk Deputy Mayor for Information Policy 
Aleksey Sevostyanov noted that although 20 countries are 
represented among students in Tomsk, there have been no 
attacks of any kind on foreigners.  A large number of 
government officials with whom we met in Tomsk -- of varying 
political views -- had previously visited the U.S. as part of 
exchange programs.  (Note: They also consistently declared 
that they were not United Russia members, although this 
included the Vice Chair of the Tomsk Election Commission, 
Yelena Obukhova, who delivered a pro-GOR broadside that would 
have made Kremlin insider Vladislav Surkov proud.  End note.) 
 
¶4. (SBU) Perhaps because of this liberal influence, Tomsk 
allows its independent journalists to operate relatively 
openly.  The independent daily Tomskaya Nedelya (the other 
main daily besides Tomskiye Novosti) airs its views generally 
free of harassment -- Sevostyanov complained that they 
"nightmarishly harangue" the government with impunity -- as 
do the independent Radio Siberia and the local television 
channel TV-2, which was cited as a shining example of media 
freedom by oppositionists and government apologists alike 
during our visit.  Sevostyanov claimed that journalists make 
a point of coming to Tomsk to work because of the increased 
freedom.  In contrast to journalists uncovering corruption in 
numerous regions of the country, no muckraking journalists 
have been beaten or attacked.  According to Sevostyanov, the 
Glasnost Defense Fund rated Tomsk among the top five regions 
of the country for press freedom.  Igor Yakovyenko, who in 
February was ousted from the Russian Union of Journalists 
because of his adversarial relationship with the government, 
has been collaborating with the Tomsk city administration to 
create a television station focusing on social issues. 
 
¶5. (SBU) The picture is not completely bright; according to 
Yabloko Duma Deputy and Regional organization leader Vasiliy 
Eremin, independent journalists have received other forms of 
bureaucratic harassment such as tax or fire inspections. 
Aleksandr Deyev, an independent candidate who lost the March 
mayoral election to United Russia incumbent Nikolay 
Nikolaychuk in an contest marked by standard "use of 
administrative resources" to ensure the "proper" result 
(reftel), also complained to us that Tomskaya Nedelya, who 
supported him in the election, had received pressure to 
withdraw their support. 
 
MOSCOW 00002559  002 OF 003 
 
 
 
Free Press, But No One Cares 
---------------------------- 
 
¶6. (SBU) Nonetheless, the greatest source of frustration for 
oppositionists such as Eremin or Deyev was simply that no one 
cared what they did.  Krasnoperov told us that he had written 
two pieces uncovering local corruption before the March 
elections, but his reports were simply ignored.  Noting a 
recent case -- "only the tip of the iceberg" -- in which the 
Deputy head of the Oktyabrskiy Rayon took bribes for showing 
preference to certain budget programs, Krasnoperov expressed 
exasperation at the lack of outrage it inspired.  He pointed 
to a blas attitude among Tomsk's younger population, saying 
that young people pay no attention to political issues; don't 
want to sacrifice or volunteer for anything; and "are all 
careerists."  He added that people generally close their eyes 
to authorities' corruption, and that the government appears 
to have "teflon" despite the economic crisis.  Lamenting that 
the best people avoid politics, Salangin quoted Yeats: "The 
best lack all conviction, while the worst/Are full of 
passionate intensity."  (As for his own forays into politics, 
Salangin said, "I'm Don Quixote.")  He said that the younger 
generation is not ready to take over, and are "allergic" to 
political activity; "they'll say they're unhappy, but they 
won't do anything.") 
 
¶7. (SBU) Agreeing with Salangin's assessment, Deyev told us 
that the greatest "academic liberal" influence in Tomsk comes 
from the university's professors, while he found cynicism and 
apathy (what he called "po fig-ism," or "to heck with 
it-ism") to be rampant among Tomsk's young students. 
Sevostyanov acknowledged that students' priorities lie with 
finding jobs rather than politics, although he noted that 
when they do apply themselves to politics, they do so with 
greater passion.  Just Russia regional organization leader 
Galina Nemtseva agreed, saying that although young people are 
"inert," their leaders are "real leaders," who understand 
that politics "is not a game."  Deyev noted that "students in 
any country are a strong social force, and the vlast (power) 
fears this"; but he lamented that students are not organized. 
 Still, he said, United Russia is not popular among young 
people in polls, and they did support his candidacy in 
greater numbers.  He added that young people's use of the 
Internet and travel helps foster cosmopolitan views as well. 
 
Dima, Forward! 
-------------- 
 
¶8. (SBU) With the exception of Krasnoperov, who expressed his 
admiration for free-market pioneer Yegor Gaidar while 
scorning Medvedev, both liberals and conservatives alike 
stated their admiration for Medvedev's ideas as expressed in 
his recent "Russia, Forward" article.  Top-down reform, in 
the minds of most people with whom we met, would be vastly 
preferable to no reform at all, if it improved the climate 
for rule of law and allowed small and medium businesses a 
fighting chance against entrenched corrupt interests.  Doom 
and gloom were undeniably rampant among the liberals; 
Krasnoperov complained that "all we did in 1989 was monetize 
the Soviet system," while Salangin said, "Twenty years ago 
during perestroika, we couldn't have imagined how far south 
it would have gone by now."  Deyev deemed a "Medvedev bunt" 
(rebellion) in opposition to powerful siloviki unlikely. 
However, Eremin stated his hope that Medvedev is "tired of 
being a puppet," and that he is quietly installing liberal 
allies at various levels of government in the hope of 
challenging the ossified system of cronyism that, in Eremin's 
view, is holding Russia back from developing.  Given the slim 
likelihood of grassroots-inspired change in the near future, 
Eremin said, "Our best hope" for increased democratization 
"is that more elites will gradually change their minds" about 
the status quo, as happened historically in countries such as 
England and Sweden.  As Salangin said, "Politically, as a 
country we're still young - we are only in our twenties." 
 
¶9. (SBU) Certainly, according to Deyev, the intelligentsia 
are placing their hopes in Medvedev.  United Russia regional 
organization leader and Deputy Speaker of the Tomsk Oblast 
Duma Aleksandr Kupriyanets called "Russia, Forward" a "trial 
balloon," with elites and intellectuals as the intended 
audience.  According to Kupriyanets, the idea is to replace 
Surkov's "sovereign democracy" with the concept of 
"competitive democracy," which they attributed to INSOR head 
and Medvedev advisor Igor Yurgens.  Noting that the 
Decembrists, several of whom lived in the Tomsk area, were 
themselves members of the elite, Kupriyanets suggested that 
top-down reform might be just what Russia needs.  On the 
other hand, he said that by bringing their intra-governmental 
debates on this issue into the open, the Kremlin co-opts any 
 
MOSCOW 00002559  003 OF 003 
 
 
debate that might take place among the public.  He mused on 
the difficult task of building a bridge of understanding 
between liberal members of the elite, and the average 
Siberian "muzhik" farmer, who feels pride of ownership of his 
possessions in the post-Soviet context, but still may not 
connect that to the increased freedoms that accompanied 
perestroika years ago. 
 
¶10. (SBU) Pointing to what he considered Medvedev's reformist 
instincts and mild temperament, Kupriyanets compared Medvedev 
to Tsar Aleksandr II, who freed the serfs in 1861.  He said 
that the government regularly carries out surveys, and pays 
close attention to polls from organizations like Levada and 
VTsIOM.  The conclusion they draw from this research, said 
Kupriyanets, is that societal attitudes are shifting at their 
own pace, and that although "there is no panacea, no golden 
key," people are gradually "taking more ownership" and 
responsibility, and recognizing that they had a stake in the 
development of the country, which he said was Medvedev's 
ultimate goal. 
 
Comment 
------- 
 
¶11. (SBU) The attempt to fathom Medvedev's ultimate 
intentions continues, no less in Tomsk than in Moscow. 
However, conversations in Tomsk support the conclusion that 
Medvedev would find ample support among local elites for a 
reformist program, were he to choose to implement his soaring 
rhetoric in a meaningful and concrete fashion.  As we saw in 
reftel, in March United Russia already had to struggle to 
maintain its iron grip on power in Tomsk.  If Medvedev 
decides to take the country in a new direction, students and 
professors alike in Tomsk will be ready to follow him -- 
although young people will first need to shake off their 
cynical and apathetic malaise. 
Beyrle