Involvement in Russian Foreign Policy
During Yeltsin presidency, SVR fought with Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs for directing Russian foreign policy. SVR director Yevgeni Primakov upstaged the foreign ministry by publishing warnings to the West not to interfere the unification of Russia with other former Soviet republics and attacking the NATO extension as a threat to Russian security, whereas foreign minister Andrey Kozyrev was telling different things. The rivalry ended in decisive victory for the SVR, when Primakov replaced Kozyrev in January 1996 and brought with him a number of SVR officers to the foreign ministry of Russia.
In September 1999, Yeltsin admitted that the SVR plays a greater role in the Russian foreign policy than the Foreign Ministry. It was reported that SVR defined Russian position on the transfer of nuclear technologies to Iran, NATO expansion, and modification of the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. SVR also tried to justify annexation of the Baltic states by the Soviet Union in World War II using selectively declassified documents.
SVR sends to the Russian president daily digests of intelligence, similar to the President's Daily Brief produced by the Central Intelligence Agency in the US. However, unlike the CIA, the SVR recommends to the president which policy options are preferable.
Read more about this topic: Foreign Intelligence Service (Russia)
Famous quotes containing the words foreign policy, involvement in, involvement, russian, foreign and/or policy:
“Foreign policy is really domestic policy with its hat on.”
—Hubert H. Humphrey (1911–1978)
“Juggling produces both practical and psychological benefits.... A woman’s involvement in one role can enhance her functioning in another. Being a wife can make it easier to work outside the home. Being a mother can facilitate the activities and foster the skills of the efficient wife or of the effective worker. And employment outside the home can contribute in substantial, practical ways to how one works within the home, as a spouse and as a parent.”
—Faye J. Crosby (20th century)
“What causes adolescents to rebel is not the assertion of authority but the arbitrary use of power, with little explanation of the rules and no involvement in decision-making. . . . Involving the adolescent in decisions doesn’t mean that you are giving up your authority. It means acknowledging that the teenager is growing up and has the right to participate in decisions that affect his or her life.”
—Laurence Steinberg (20th century)
“Louise, something in me tightens when an American intellectual’s eyes shine, and they start to talk to me about the Russian people. Something in me says, Watch it, a new version of Irish Catholicism is being offered for your faith.”
—Warren Beatty (b. 1937)
“For most visitors to Manhattan, both foreign and domestic, New York is the Shrine of the Good Time. “I don’t see how you stand it,” they often say to the native New Yorker who has been sitting up past his bedtime for a week in an attempt to tire his guest out. “It’s all right for a week or so, but give me the little old home town when it comes to living.” And, under his breath, the New Yorker endorses the transfer and wonders himself how he stands it.”
—Robert Benchley (1889–1945)
“While I am in favor of the Government promptly enforcing the laws for the present, defending the forts and collecting the revenue, I am not in favor of a war policy with a view to the conquest of any of the slave States; except such as are needed to give us a good boundary. If Maryland attempts to go off, suppress her in order to save the Potomac and the District of Columbia. Cut a piece off of western Virginia and keep Missouri and all the Territories.”
—Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822–1893)