The Media Mirror – Today's Russian press review

The Georgian protests dominate the headlines in the Russian press, along with Russia’s moratorium on the treaty on conventional forces in Europe and a pinch of October Revolution of 1917 memories.

In a brief return to the 90th anniversary of the Bolshevik revolution IZVESTIA daily shows a picture of the Ipatiev house in Ekaterinburg. This is where, in 1918, the former Russian Emperor Nicholas II and his family were executed. The photograph was taken by a hidden camera in 1977 during the Communist Party-ordered demolition of the house.

The same newspaper says both sides in the Georgian conflict accuse each other of “pursuing Moscow’s interests”.

ROSSIYSKAYA GAZETA daily writes the “white revolution” in Georgia ended in a sweep. At first the protesters didn’t see the special forces soldiers behind a long line of janitors and garbage trucks. Then, writes the paper, the people were swept out along with the garbage accumulated over a few days. However, continues the paper, the rough handling by Saakashvili loyalists failed to discourage the opposition which has now got its second wind.

KOMSOMOLSKAYA PRAVDA daily publishes a few eyewitness accounts of the beatings in Tbilisi including a telephone conversation with Russia Today’s correspondent Ekaterina Azarova, who got hit by a rubber bullet and had to breathe tear gas together with the crowd.

NEZAVISIMAYA GAZETA newspaper says in its editorial that the main lesson for Mikhail Saakashvili is that revolutions always end in a period of quiet. Experienced politicians use it to restore, build and create. Saakashvili failed to shift from the mode of a people’s tribune to that of a meticulous reformer.

IZVESTIA daily took another sample of public opinion over the internet. This time on the Russian moratorium on the Treaty on Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE). It shows 31% of the participants seeing no sense in further bargaining over the treaty because the U.S. ‘would trick us again the same way it did with the eastward expansion of NATO’. 60% say no negotiations while the threat of U.S. missile defence deployment still exists.

VREMYA NOVOSTEI daily says that NATO hints at the possibility of the signing the amended version of the treaty by its member states, which is what Russia is trying to achieve by the moratorium on the original version. The paper adds that if it doesn’t happen, the expression “the cold war of the 21st Century” won’t remain just a figure of speech much longer.