The Real Russia. Today. Russia's war on Telegram takes down Google services, and say hi to Viktor Vekselberg's U.S. problems

Monday, April 23, 2018

• Russia's crackdown on Telegram disrupts Google services across the country
• Telegram supporters stage some creative protests against censorship
• Gazprom gets rolling on a major new gas refinery
• Public sector salaries are rising, but spiking inflation could be around the corner
• Two opposition leaders want to protest Putin's inauguration next month
• Investigators drop a hate speech case against a satirical poet
• Viktor Vekselberg's frozen assets in the U.S. are a blow to Sberbank and a relative who donated to Trump
• Washington will cut Rusal a break if Deripaska divests

Google services fail as the Telegram block enters Week Two ⛔️

On April 23, Russian Internet users reported mass disruptions to almost all services offered by Google — from the main search engine to the company’s reCAPTCHA (which distinguishes human users from bots). The outages started after Russia’s federal censor added another 118 Google IP addresses to the country’s Internet blacklist over the weekend.

After a wave of complaints from the public, Roskomnadzor issued several statements on Monday denying that it has blocked Google’s online services. The agency says the Google disruptions are the result of problems with the traffic filtering systems operated by Russian Internet providers. Roskomnadzor specifically says it hasn’t blocked YouTube, Gmail, the Web version of Google Play, Google Drive, and reCAPTCHA.

The Russian Association of Motor Insurers says its sales of third-party insurance plummeted on Monday when Google’s reCAPTCHA stopped working reliably on its website.

✊ Here's how the digital generation protests

In a sweeping effort to cut access to the instant messenger Telegram, Russia’s federal censor has spent the past five days blocking millions of IP addresses, which has disrupted online businesses with no connection to Telegram, other than shared cloud servers. Never a popular government agency, Roskomnadzor is now one of the most hated institutions in the Russian state bureaucracy, and Internet users want people to know it.

• Read Meduza’s report: “Google Maps users attack Russia's federal censor, reclassifying it as a ‘permanently closed’ ‘gay bar’”

Telegram founder and CEO Pavel Durov is calling for a nationwide demonstration in Russia on Sunday, April 29. He’s asking Russians to fly paper airplanes out of their windows at 7 p.m., Moscow time, in support of Internet freedom. Telegram coordinated an identical rally on Sunday, April 22. You can view photos of that demonstration here

Gazprom's northern plans 🛢

Outside St. Petersburg, in Ust-Luga, Gazprom has reportedly started constructing a $20-billion gas refinery that will be able to process as much as 45 billion cubic meters a year. The new plant will purify methane for liquefaction at the Baltic LNG plant, which Gazprom also wants to build in Ust-Luga, where its product can be pumped into tankers. Most of the processed gas, however, would be delivered to Europe through the Nord Stream 2 pipeline. To build these facilities outside St. Petersburg, the company has contracted Rusgazdobycha, which previously belonged to Arkady Rotenberg. So far, Gazprom has only confirmed that its Ust-Luga project is in the development stage.

Vova delivers 💵

Public sector salaries in Russia are expected to grow by 13 to 15 percent in 2018 (three times more than the predicted inflation rate), according to a new study by the Central Bank. The raises are just the latest stage in implementing Vladimir Putin’s May 2012 executive orders. The Central Bank’s report warns that the higher government pay and rising wages in the oil refining industry open the door to accelerating inflation. After his inauguration next month, President Putin is expected to issue another round of May orders.

Protesting another inauguration 📢

Activists Sergey Udaltsov and Alexey Navalny are requesting permits for public demonstrations ahead of Vladimir Putin’s next inauguration on May 7. Udaltsov’s Left Front movement has filed a permit application in Moscow to stage a rally in Revolution Square on May 6. Navalny’s supporters, meanwhile, have asked local officials in cities across the country to hold anti-Putin protests on May 5. Six years ago (a day before Putin’s last inauguration), a mass rally in Moscow led to criminal charges against more than 30 demonstrators for supposedly using violence against police officers.

The poet is free to go ✍️

Investigators in Krasnodar have dropped their case against a local poet who was suspected of hate speech for a poem about burning an atheist teacher at the stake. The case was opened last October. The poet, Maxim Drozdov, always insisted that his text, which he published on Vkontakte, was a work of satire. Investigators ultimately agreed, classifying his social media post as legal “self-expression.”

Oligarch sanctions hit Sberbank and a Trump supporter 💸

According to the newsletter The Bell, shortly before he was sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department, billionaire Viktor Vekselberg became an investor in SBT Venture Capital II at Sberbank CEO German Gref’s personal request. Roughly 20 percent of the venture fund’s $75 million comes from Sberbank, with the rest coming mostly from private Russian investors. Sources told The Bell that “one of Vekselberg’s funds in the U.S.” was informed by an American bank a few hours before the “oligarch sanctions” were announced that its account has been frozen. The fund now has until June 5 to sell off Vekselberg’s shares (at a loss). The money, moreover, won’t return to Vekselberg; it will be transferred to a special U.S.-based bank account and frozen. A source told The Bell that Vekselberg has invested roughly $1 billion in American funds.

Over the weekend, Reuters reported that U.S. sanctions have led to the freezing of as much as $2 billion in global assets owned by Vekselberg and his Renova Group conglomerate. Renova also owns an American subsidiary called Columbus Nova Technology Partners, which is run by Andrew Intrater, Vekselberg’s U.S. citizen cousin. Intrater donated $250,000 to Donald Trump’s inauguration fund, as well as $35,000 to a joint fundraising committee for Trump’s reelection and the Republican National Committee.

Washington's quid pro quo to Rusal 🤝

The U.S. Treasury Department says it will provide sanctions relief to Rusal if CEO Oleg Deripaska relinquishes control of the Russian aluminum producer. “RUSAL has felt the impact of U.S. sanctions because of its entanglement with Oleg Deripaska, but the U.S. government is not targeting the hardworking people who depend on RUSAL and its subsidiaries,” said Treasury Secretary Mnuchin on Monday. RUSAL, he says, has approached the United States government “to petition for delisting.”